In writing this week's long-term care insurance review, I found a few interesting stories to share with you, the loyal readers of this blog on LTC and all of the issues surrounding it.

In Connecticut, Mob-Rule on Rate Increases

I'm normally more of a "republic" style guy than a true democracy, but I like one idea put fourth in Connecticut this week.  The idea from Hartford, CT is to regulate long-term care insurance rate increases with public hearings.  I think in order for companies to raise rates, they need to really come under the microscope and be transparent with everyone.  Plus, they need to bask in the bad-PR glow of their rate increases.  Coming on the heels of a recent 9% Genworth rate increases, which as the story points out is much lower than many other long-term care insurancerate increases lately, some as much as 50%, on top of past increases of that much as well.

About 1,861 Connecticut long-term care insurance poliyholders were affected by the recent Genworth increase, leading to just over thirty complaints.  Expect John Hancock to increase some rates soon, as previously posted here on the blog.  Here's the reasoning behind Genworth's increase:

Genworth had anticipated that about 5 percent of policyholders a year would voluntarily stop paying their premiums on the long-term care policies. As it turns out, only about 1 percent of policyholders have stopped paying, Topinka said, and more people keeping their policies translates to more claims.

Hancock is claiming the same thing.  I expect more carriers to follow suit on some older policies.  The good news for newcomers to long-term care is that this is just one more kink that has been worked out of the system by early adopters.  Always keep in mind that the carriers all do leave themselves with room for future rate increases, so plan for the possibility when considering long-term care insurance, whether from Genworth, John Hancock, or otherwise.  (Request a quote at the bottom of this page!)

NAIC finds work needed to clarify what vote means

This is a re-post from the NAIC NewsWire | 06/04/2008

Insurance regulators meeting Monday in San Francisco discovered they disagreed on what their vote means when asked to approve a model law that revised NAIC's Long Term Care Insurance Model Act provisions for claim denials. In the discussion, one commissioner called for one vote on the model and another to designate who would lobby for its passage, while others abstained or opposed the measure because their states had higher standards.

Another article I found, How to Identify a Partnership-Qualified Long-Term Care Insurance Policy is good reading for those living in the ever-growing number of  states that have Partnership programs.