Homeinsurance.com said the typical premium for a new policy in December 2011 was $810 nationwide, up from $682 in January 2011.

The company said its quarterly RateReport data represents approximately 15,000 policies sold across the United States with various carriers including Travelers, Safeco, The Hartford, and ASI/Ark Royal.

RateReport shows that on a nationwide basis, homeowners are paying, on average, $128 more per year for new home insurance than they were at the beginning of the year.

Premium increases were more dramatic in some states than others, including Mississippi, Montana and New Mexico where new policies in December 2011 were seeing 29-39 percent higher premiums than those sold in January 2011.

There were also spots with lower rates towards the end of 2011 including Washington D.C., where homeowners were paying about 7 percent less for new policies. Also new policies sold in December 2011 in Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia and California decreased in price as compared to earlier in the year when they were 1 to 3 percent higher.

Two of the six hurricanes will be major with winds of at least 111 miles (178 km) per hour, the Andover, Maryland-based forecaster said.

It said the 2012 forecast numbers were slightly below the adjusted long-term average for 1950-2011 of 12 tropical storms, seven hurricanes and three intense hurricanes.

The hurricane season in the Atlantic, Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico runs from June 1 through Nov. 30.

“After very active tropical seasons in 2010 and 2011, we expect fewer storms to develop this hurricane season,” said Todd Crawford, Weather Services International’s chief meteorologist.

WSI’s outlook for the season is in line with one issued earlier this month by the respected team of forecasters at Colorado State University.

As with Colorado State, Crawford said calls for a milder 2012 season were based on two factors. Hurricanes thrive on warm water and the Atlantic Ocean has cooled this year, he said.

He said there may also be a trend toward development of an El Nino effect this summer, fueling hopes for a “notable reduction” in tropical storm activity.

El Nino is a warming of sea surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific that occurs every four to 12 years and has far-ranging effects around the globe.

The weather phenomenon creates wind shear that makes it harder for nascent storms to develop into hurricanes in the Atlantic-Caribbean basin, but it also can produce drought and crop failure in parts of South Asia and unseasonably wet conditions in western coastal areas of South America.

“There is still uncertainty regarding the development of El Nino, which will impact future (forecast) updates. If the chances of El Nino development increase, our forecast numbers will likely go down even further in future updates,” Crawford said.

STAY ON ALERT, COMMUNITIES URGED
He said there was no particularly strong landfall signal — signs that storms could affect land –for 2012 so far. But residents of vulnerable Gulf coast communities, and energy and oil producers in the U.S. Gulf oil patch, should be wary.

“For 2012, our landfall model predicts slightly below-normal probabilities of landfall from Florida and up the East Coast, with slightly above-normal probabilities in the Gulf,” Crawford said.

Colorado State University forecasters, in their outlook issued on April 4, predicted 10 tropical storms in the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, with four strengthening into hurricanes.

Of those, they said two would become major hurricanes with sustained winds reaching Category 3 or greater status on the Saffir-Simpson intensity scale and powerful enough to cause devastating damage.

The 2011 Atlantic hurricane season saw a total of 19 named or tropical storms of which seven became hurricanes, including three major hurricanes.

Irene was the lone hurricane to hit the United States in 2011, but it was first one to do so since Hurricane Ike struck southeast Texas in 2008. Irene was also the most significant tropical cyclone to strike the Northeast since Hurricane Bob in 1991, according to U.S. government forecasters.

The selection puts Standard in the top 10 percent of agencies contracted with Builders Mutual.

“Standard Insurance & Realty has shown tremendous growth and profitability through the last three years, and Builders Mutual is pleased to include them in our 2012 group of Champions Club agencies,” Brad Moock, Builders Mutual’s assistant vice president of business development, is quoted as saying in a release. “We will continue to work closely with Standard Insurance & Realty to provide service and support.”

Standard was chosen for the honor from more than 600 insurance agencies.

Headquartered in Raleigh, Builders Mutual is one of the Southeast’s largest residential and commercial construction insurance agencies.

For further tips, visit the U.S. Department of Transportation’s distracted driving website at www.distraction.gov. For more information on the new commercial driving regulations, visit www.fmcsa.dot.gov.

More than a dozen employers have been ordered to come to a hearing May 22 and settle a claim that has dragged for years. If the business owners don’t – and can’t settle a portion of the claim – they’ll be ordered to jail. Law enforcement will be sent to arrest those who don’t show up for the hearing, officials say.

The efforts follow a News & Observer investigation this month which revealed that tens of thousands of employers required to protect their workers with insurance don’t. And when workers were hurt, the commission has done little to ensure the uninsured employer paid the workers’ medical bills and wages for missed work. Some workers ended up permanently disabled and reliant on Medicaid and welfare to survive.

“In response to the issues you raised, we now have some concrete plans,” said Pamela Young, chairwoman of the North Carolina Industrial Commission, the state agency charged with enforcing the workers’ comp laws.

In addition to the May 22 contempt hearing, the commission will schedule other special hearings to deal with lingering uninsured cases. Commission staff reached out to nearly 100 workers who reported they’ve been injured on the job and whose company didn’t have coverage. Most of those cases had fallen through the cracks because the worker didn’t have an attorney to press for collection.

About 125 uninsured employers who ignored the commission’s orders to pay the worker and penalties will be called back, too.

Young said the commission is spreading the word that it is serious about enforcing workers’ compensation laws, which require employers with three or more employees to carry insurance for workplace injuries. The law, which dates back to the 1930s, is supposed to ensure that industry takes care of its own accidents.

Leonard Jernigan, a workers’ compensation lawyer and national expert on employer fraud, said Young’s efforts are a step in the right direction.

“I’m delighted that they are in fact going after this,” Jernigan said. “It’s been greatly needed.”

Vicarious Liability
• Business owners will generally be held liable for injuries to third parties caused by their workers within the scope of their employment. This applies whether the employee is driving a company-owned or a personal vehicle.
• What is considered to be “within the scope of employment” will differ for each employee, but generally if it’s something a manager authorizes the employee to do, or it is necessary for the employee to carry out his or her job function, then it fits.
• The business owner does not even need to be aware of what the employee is doing when they are involved in an incident, as long as the activity is related to the employment. An exception to this rule is when an employee commits an intentional bad act, or when they deviate so far from work-related activities that they are no longer considered acting on behalf of the company.

Negligent Entrustment
• Business owners may also be held liable if they allow an employee whom they know to be unlicensed, incompetent or unqualified to drive a company car.
• “Knowledge of incompetence” may be knowledge that the employee had been drinking alcohol and/or has a history of getting drunk, or has a history of reckless driving.
• A business owner will be liable if they knew or had reason to know that an employee was incompetent to drive, whether due to mental or physical incapacitation, intoxication or medication.

Under new federal regulations, commercial motor vehicle (CMV) drivers are pro¬hibited from using hand-held cell phones while driving. Infractions may result in penalties of up to $2,750 for individual drivers, with the potential to lose their CMV license, and fines of up to $11,000 for employers who “require or allow” their drivers to use hand-held cell phones while driving.

CMV drivers are not the only ones who need to be careful, though: An employee driving a company car, or driving their personal car for business use, can make you liable as well.

North Carolina Industrial Commission Chair Pamela Young said she is prepared to work with the state’s attorney general to examine the commission’s enforcement efforts.

Under state law, employers with more than three employees must purchase workers’ compensation coverage.

“The North Carolina workers’ compensation system faces many challenges, including ensuring that employers are providing the necessary and adequate coverage for their employees,” said Young in a statement.

The commission’s actions came in response to a study conducted by the Raleigh, N.C.-based News and Observer that found tens of thousands of businesses may be operating without coverage.

The North Carolina Rate Bureau reported that insurers in the state are providing coverage to more than140,000 businesses, with another 117 large companies self-insured. The North Carolina Department of Commerce statistics show there are upwards of 170,000 employers with more than four employees in the state.

By law, employers are required to inform the Industrial Commission when they purchase, renew or cancel coverage. However, the commission contracts with the rate bureau to collect that information and provided it to the commission.

Commission officials acknowledge using the database to find the insurer responsible for covering a claim, but do not monitor cancellations. As a result, they only find out an employer is without coverage when an injured worker files a claim.

And in those cases, little is done.

The law states that employers found not in compliance with the law can be fined $100 per day and charged fort the cost of any benefits and medical expenses the injured worker should have collected.

The Industrial Commission’s Fraud Unit reported that since January 2011, it has only pursued 225 cases where employers where found not to have proper coverage. The unit reported collecting $30,500 in fines, which equals around $135 per case.

And those cases only reflect the employers the fraud investigators can actually track down. Investigators said that it can be hard to find employers who purposely seek to break the law, especially in the construction industry where subcontractors purchase policies to secure a contract only to turn around and cancel it.

Young offered no specifics about the review.

“We will continue to meet with stakeholders on this very issue, and, as we always have, the commission will review its operations to make certain they are as efficient and effective as possible,” she said.

Some state lawmakers are calling on the Legislature to take action. One potential proposal would give the state’s Department of Insurance the power to investigate workers’ compensation fraud. Insurance Commissioner Wayne Goodwin indicated the department would be willing to do so.

State lawmakers last year enacted a workers’ compensation reform bill that for the first time placed a cap on the amount of weeks an injured worker could receive benefits due to a permanent injury.

The law set a cap of 500 weeks or roughly 10 years on total disability payments and raised the cap on partial disability payments from 300 to 500 weeks. The new law also allows insurers greater access to injured workers’ medical records.

Center officials are joining with a consumer advocate group at the National Hurricane Conference in Orlando, Fla. this week to encourage residents to skip taping their windows when a hurricane is heading their way. They believe it leads to a false sense of security and actually increases danger.

Instead, residents should use proven methods such as hurricane shutters or impact-resistant windows, Bill Read, director of the National Hurricane Center, told hundreds of meteorologists and emergency management officials at the week-long conference. Attendees are going to seminars on insurance policy and emergency communications as well as hawking hurricane-related wares such as canned food and building-hardening materials.

“Our goal is to break this myth,” Read said, referring to taping. “It does not protect your windows. At best, it’s an inconvenience. At worst, some people have the illusion that they’re safe … and people can get severely hurt.”

Taping windows can create larger and deadlier shards of glass when winds blow through a home, said Leslie Chapman-Henderson, president and CEO of Federal Alliance for Safe Homes.

“The shards can become bigger because they’re being held together,” Chapman-Henderson said. “You’re wasting your time. You’re wasting your money and you’re potentially increasing the danger to your home.”

Even some disaster management officials are guilty of advising residents to use tape on their windows. Read said when he started working in the 1970s, taping windows was still advised in hurricane brochures. That advice was eliminated from brochures in the 1980s, “but it still persists today,” he said.

Hurricane Irene’s devastation last year in Vermont and upstate New York was an impetus for the campaign, said Chapman-Henderson, because thousands of residents in the northeast taped their windows. Her group is enlisting local TV meteorologists to tell viewers “Go Tapeless” at the start of the coming Atlantic hurricane season, which starts in June.

Irene, which barreled up the Eastern seaboard last August and caused the most damage in upstate New York and New England, also reinforced the notion that hurricanes are not just about damage from winds and storm surges but also from rainfall and flooding and spinoff tornadoes, said Craig Fugate, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Irene caused $1.5 billion in damage in New York and $515 million in damage in Vermont. Last season’s 19 tropical storms, seven hurricanes and four major hurricanes tied for the third busiest season since records have been kept, officials said.

“If nothing else, Irene reminds everyone that hurricanes are all hazards,” Fugate said. “Who would have thought that some of the heaviest damage would occur in Vermont and upstate New York?”