Fines follow 15 hours of work in 59 minutes [Star Tribune, Minneapolis]

Sept. 15--Forty insurance agents have agreed to pay $3,000 fines and go back to school after admitting they attended bogus classes to satisfy state licensing requirements. Two other agents surrendered their licenses rather than pay the fines.

The wave of discipline follows the state's investigation of Robert W. Huge, who provided phony continuing education classes to more than 300 insurance professionals in the metro area, according to an investigation by the state Department of Commerce.

Department spokeswoman Nicole Garrison-Sprenger declined to say whether more agents will be penalized.

In one class observed by an undercover investigator last year, students were able to get credit for 15 hours of work in just 59 minutes, while Huge and other organizers encouraged students to cheat and falsify attendance records.

Susan Stein of St. Paul agreed to have her license revoked rather than fight or pay the $3,000 fine. In an interview Tuesday, she said all the agents in her office participated.

"Did I know I was getting away with something? Yeah," Stein said. But she didn't raise any concern, because Huge was licensed by the state and her company arranged the classes, she said.

In June, state regulators suspended the licenses of Huge and two Aflac agents who allegedly helped organize the class through Excel Training Inc. The company and its owner, Donald Knutson, were also barred from offering any more classes.

Licensed insurance producers have to take these kinds of courses to keep their licenses.

For consumers, the classes are meant to ensure their agents are well-versed in the laws that govern the industry and are up to date with industry products and standards, according to the department.

Since Aug. 1, the state has reached agreements with 43 people. Each admits that claiming 24 to 45 hours of fraudulent education credits amounted to "an untrustworthy and deceptive act." Forty individuals have agreed to earn the credits legitimately within the next few months or else have their licenses suspended.

Stein said she was laid off a week before she received the letter from the Commerce Department, so she decided to give up her part-time career selling insurance rather than find $3,000.

Deborah Schraber of Golden Valley also gave up her license rather than pay the fine.

"In most of the continuing education things, it's like half the people are reading the magazines anyway," Schraber said. "What I was upset about, we're getting penalized for something he did."

Schraber said she sold insurance for nearly 10 years before going on maternity leave last year. She said it's unfair to hit agents with a $3,000 fine for attending Huge's abbreviated classes.

"This guy was obviously pocketing a lot of money," Schraber said. "If they feel like they need to punish people, there should have been another way around it."

The state also suspended the license of one insurance producer, Nicole Pavlish of Savage. Pavlish also agreed to stay out of the insurance business for at least a year and then pay a $3,000 fine if she wants to renew her license before 2016, according to the consent order.

James Eli Shiffer --612-673-4271

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