ANIELLO'S "TWO CENTS WORTH"
JANURARY 2019


IN THIS EDITION:
Some Of The Legends We Lost In 2018
Make Sure Your Business Has Adequate Liability Coverage
Tracking Device For Auto Insurance
How To Battle The New Year's Blues
Pharmacies Able To Disclose Pricing To Consumers

Saying Goodbye...
Celebrities We Lost In 2018
The Potential Bankruptcy of Pacific Gas & Electric In California May Teach Us All Something About Our
Liability Coverage

The potential bankruptcy of one of California's largest utility companies, Pacific Gas & Electric, could have been prevented with higher General Liability limits and Excess Liability coverage.

A lawsuit suggesting that the utility company is responsible for the recent wildfires in California that killed 86 and displaces 50,000 people from their homes, illustrates why most companies need to reevaluate their current insurance coverage limits to protect their financial interests.

The standard for the past 20 years has seen General Liability policies cover
$1 million for each occurrence, $2 million in the aggregate and $2 million for products and completed operations. However, inflation alone can out-date those numbers quickly. Most businesses will want to consider layered Excess Liability policy that could cover bodily injuries, property damage, third party damages, legal costs and more. Even smaller businesses have risks that can result in catastrophic damages.


Auto Insurance Tracking Device
Yes or No?
You’ve probably heard that insurance companies are offering  trackers
to either lower your policy costs, or offer a discount for good behavior. This might indeed present a series of benefits, but there are some cons to consider before accepting an auto insurance tracking device in your car.
Weigh the pros and cons before getting an auto insurance tracking device. It could mean a good amount of savings plus an added security feature for you and your family; or it could mean more premium but with added benefits. Just keep in mind that some insurance companies may disclose the data they track, so make sure you not only read the fine print, but also specifically request a list of items that will be stored.

  • Lower premiums: This is the primary benefit to the consumer and the most common reason why people choose to install them. By linking insurance premiums to your actual driving habits, an insurance company can be more precise with the premium it charges you. Thus, if you are a good driver, you’ll likely pay a lower premium than what you would without it.
  • Estimation of damages: Data collection from your vehicle allows insurance companies to more accurately recreate accidents and estimate the compensation you are owed in the event that your vehicle is damaged in an accident.
  • Security: If your telematics device tracks your vehicle’s location, it will be much easier for the police to find and can thereby lower accident and theft related insurance costs.
Cons
  • Privacy: The most frequently cited drawback of telematics devices is that you give up a little bit of your privacy when you use them. Each insurance company can program a device to track different things, but the most invasive metrics insurance companies track is your location. Many are simply not comfortable with their insurance company having this information.
  • Raw data is not a good indicator of driver safety: You may think you are a safe driver, but insurance companies have their own definition of what they consider to be “safe.” For example, most insurance companies consider extreme braking events to be examples of dangerous driving. But let’s say you live in a crowded urban environment and you frequently slam your brakes to avoid pedestrians darting into streets or cars in front of you suddenly stopping. A telematics device is incapable of distinguishing between good extreme braking and bad extreme braking, and your insurance company could raise your rates on the basis of this information.
  • The discount might not be that great: A 2016 Pew survey found that many drivers who use telematics devices actually never receive their promised discounts at all or receive a mush smaller discount than they were promised
FEELING UNEASY? ANGRY? SAD? SCARED? OR MAYBE YOU CAN'T PUT YOUR FINGER ON YOUR EMOTION....
YOU JUST KNOW IT'S NOT GOOD.

You are not alone! Many people feel this way over the holidays and into the New Year. There are many reasons why this season affects people this way from spending money you couldn't afford to, to the excessive amount of food and sugar we consume along with lack of exercise. You may have experienced a tragedy at this time of year or you are just evaluating your life and not feeling satisfied going into a New Year.

First of all, it is important to remember that others are experiencing many of these same feelings. Secondly, understand that there are ways to help combat these negative emotions. You may want to start with trying this 5 step challenge: NOTICE, TALK, ACCEPT, LET GO AND NOTICE AGAIN.


New Federal Laws Banning “Gag Clauses” in the Pharmacy To Improve Disclosure Of Pricing Information To Consumers
On October 10, 2018, President Donald Trump signed into law the “Know the Lowest Price Act” and the “Patients’ Right to Know Drug Prices Act,” which aim to improve consumer access to drug price information by banning gag clauses.

These bills—one of which applies to Medicare and the other to commercial insurance plans—ban “gag order” clauses in contracts between pharmacies and pharmacy benefit managers (“PBMs”) that are designed to prevent pharmacists from disclosing to a patient at the pharmacy point of sale whether or not a drug’s cash price would be lower than the patient’s cost-sharing burden under his or her insurance plan. Pharmacies that had violated contractual gag orders have traditionally risked losing their network contracts with PBMs or faced other sanctions.

The  bill affecting Medicare beneficiaries  will go into effect on January 1, 2020, while the  bill banning “gag order” clauses for commercial insurance contracts  took effect immediately upon signing by President Trump.While these new federal laws will ensure and promote transparency between pharmacists and patients and the potentially improved disclosure of pricing information, it is unclear whether these new federal laws will dramatically reduce costs for consumers.
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