NAIC’s Interstate Compact, NIPR Announce Expansions

Copyright 2009 A.M. Best Company, Inc.All Rights Reserved BestWire

March 19, 2009 Thursday 04:11 PM EST

392 words

NAIC's Interstate Compact, NIPR Announce Expansions

Sean P Carr

SAN DIEGO

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners' affiliate organizations announced expansions, with Mississippi joining the Interstate Compact and the National Insurance Producer Registry launching a new program for instant processing of producer-licensing transactions.

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour signed legislation, S.B. 2841, linking his state to the compact, a central product filing platform formally known as the Interstate Insurance Product Regulation Commission. "The compact legislation is important for modernization of the product-filing review and approval process for Mississippi companies and consumers," state Insurance Commissioner Mike Chaney said in a statement.

In five years, 34 states and jurisdictions have joined the compact. The IIPRC acts as a central point of electronic product filing under uniform standards, enabling state insurance regulators to develop uniform national standards for products including life insurance, annuities, disability income and long-term care insurance. More than 50 uniform standards have been adopted to date. Filings received by the compact are currently being reviewed and approved within an average turnaround time of less than 30 days.

Several more states will likely join the Interstate Compact this year, NAIC President and New Hampshire Insurance Commissioner Roger Sevigny said at the NAIC's Spring National Meeting.

The NIPR will also partner with the NAIC's State Based Systems product suite to allow all licensing transactions -- including original and renewal applications, appointments and terminations and address change requests -- to be processed by states on a near-immediate basis. The process will be cut from 24-48 hours to two minutes, the NIPR announced.

"SBS, through its membership-driven uniformity initiatives, makes NIPR more efficient by providing a tool suite that is consistent from state to state," Alaska Insurance Commissioner and NIPR President Linda Hall said in a statement.

SBS is a Web-based tool developed by the NAIC and state regulators to manage back-office operations. NAIC jurisdictions using SBS are Alabama, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, North Dakota, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Washington, D.C.

(By Sean P. Carr, senior associate editor, BestWeek: [email protected])

March 20, 2009