Insurer Fined For Charging Wash. Students Incorrect Rates
OLYMPIA, Wash. – The Washington state insurance commissioner has fined an Indiana company $100,000 for charging Washington college students the wrong rates.
Unicare Life and Health Insurance sold over 8,000 insurance policies, primarily to international students, between 2004 and 2009. Most were short-term policies costing an average of $80 a month. The problem is, the company used unapproved methods to determine those rates. Unicare also excluded people from coverage whom they shouldn’t have. Rich Roesler is a spokesperson for the state’s insurance office.
Roesler: “The thing is, many of these things went on for four or five years at a time. So it’s hard for the company to argue that it was just an inadvertent oversight. This went on for quite a while with quite a few policies.”
Roesler says that’s why the state pursued a large monetary fine. Unicare has said they will pay. The $100,000 will go into the state’s general fund. Usually the state would’ve also asked the company to pay back clients they overcharged, Roesler says. But in this case, the state couldn’t determine who was charged what.
Copyright 2012 KUOW
Related Stories:
Grupos buscan mejorar comunicación sobre incendios forestales con hispanohablantes en Washington
A medida que comienza la temporada de incendios forestales en el estado de Washington, activistas están trabajando para asegurarse de que las personas que solo hablan español reciban información importante durante las emergencias.
Town hall helps Wenatchee Valley families talk to their children in the wake of the deaths of three young girls
At a town hall in East Wenatchee, a brown dog named Ruffles Lackey made the rounds, inviting attendees to rub her belly. Ruffles, an animal-assisted crisis response dog, was there to comfort community members coping with stress and grief.
Pasco-based rescue helping rehome dogs from Whitman county animal hoarding case
A Pasco-based animal rescue is helping rehome and foster dogs from an animal hoarding case out of Whitman County.
