Litigation

Use of Qualified Settlement Fund Will Mitigate Factoring Problem...Says NYU Law Student

Posted on September 28, 2009
The purpose of this post is to focus on the 8th wonder. NO, NOT THE"Old School classic " by The Sugarhill Gang I'm "wondering" about S2KM's incredible 8TH POST about their putative "Elvis Presley" of structured settlements, NY Law School...

New Bentzen "Snirtle" ...

Posted on September 26, 2009
It truly is an amazing feat that B.S. can get more traffic on Internet than EPS Settlements Group and SFA! Yes that's right B.S. as in "Bentzen says", and Alexa! And Bentzen doesn't say much, the only things she's written...

"The Logan Report"

Posted on September 25, 2009
Revered NSSTA Board Member Jim Logan continues to characterize an industry professional certification in a manner that* is misleading, and inconsistent with the guidelines set down and perhaps voted on by the Board on which he serves. How can this...

The Price of Admission! Or Is It a Lack of "The Willingness to Discern"?

Posted on September 25, 2009
What goes on in those "smoke filled rooms"? From an email entitled "Plaintiffs only structured attorney fees" obtained today by this author that was sent by one lawyer (and via the list serve copied to a dedicated email address at...

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Settlement Advisors FAQ is Incorrect

Posted on September 25, 2009
Huver and Associates Structured Settlement FAQ #11 Q. Can some other entity besides the defendant purchase the tax-exempt settlement annuity? A. Yes, under certain circumstances. If conditions exist pursuant to IRC Section 468B, a Qualified Settlement Fund could step in...

John Hancock Announces Organizational Changes

Posted on September 24, 2009
John Hancock has announced organizational changes pending regulatory approval Pending regulatory approval, John Hancock Life Insurance Company (?JHLICO?, which issues structured settlement annuities (and guarantees the payment of periodic payment obligations assigned to John Hancock Assignment) is to be merged...

Hartford P&C Structured Settlement Program Makes Positive Changes

Posted on September 24, 2009
Positive changes have been made with respect to Hartford's structured settlement program. If a structured settlement annuity is being considered, the broker must provide to the claimant at least two different annuity company quotes for the claimant to make a...

S2KM Reviews Jeremy Babener QSF Paper-2 Start Eye roll...NOW!

Posted on September 24, 2009
Just finished Patrick Hindert's homage to himself on S2KM's Beyond Structured Settlements blog. You'd think that if Jeremy Babener thought anything of his interview with Hindert, HE'D have posted it on his own blog. But I guess that antsy pantsy...

Cagney and Bracy

Posted on September 23, 2009
Is Trish Laborde of Stone Street Capital angling to star with me in a modern day version of Dan Ackroyd and Jane Curtin?s popular Point-Counterpoint segment on Saturday Night Live? No, NOT "The Coneheads", I?m talking Weekend Update, as in...

Structured Settlement Website Rankings September 2009 (USA only stat now ranked too)

Posted on September 20, 2009
Three Month Trailing Top 10 Global Traffic Rank (Alexa Rank as of 09/20/2009) of Structured Settlement and Settlement Planning Industry websites* (+ or- traffic from 08/20/2009 report). Lower number means more traffic (e.g. Google.com is ranked 1 in the overall...

Can "Cheap Labor" Get The Job Done on Single Claimant 468B Qualified Settlement Fund?

Posted on September 20, 2009
What a brilliant strategy! Is law student Jeremy Babener as a "cheap but erudite tool" of those who have hundreds of thousands of dollars vested in a project to convince Treasury to issue guidance as to IRC 468B concerning the...

Structured Settlement Market Likely to Consolidate Further in 2009

Posted on September 18, 2009
The air is ripe for another currently writing structured settlement annuity company to withdraw from the market before the end of the year. Stay tuned for details. When he's finished blowing smoke up NYU law student Jeremy Babener's skirt about...

John Darer is Latest New Commentator For Legal Broadcast Network

Posted on September 18, 2009
In its press release of September 18, 2009 The Legal Broadcast Network, a premier news, commentary and broadcast platform for lawyers, educators and journalists announced that John Darer, yours truly, has joined the network as a commentator. I will be...

Connecticut DOUBLES Agents' Licensing Cost But FAILS to Plug Regulatory Gap and Let's "Financial Crack" Dealers Into State to Solicit Residents At No Cost or Recourse

Posted on September 17, 2009
The Connecticut Insurance Department has posted a new schedule of fees, effective next month, which doubles the cost of most insurance agents' licenses. Among the increases: producers license fees and renewals jumped from $40 to $80, and exam fees have...

CSSC Sponsor NSSTA Must Add CE Requirement Now!

Posted on September 16, 2009
New rules proposed by the State of Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services designed to protect consumers might lead to some additional "white space" on the business cards of settlement professionals. 836-080-0160 (NEW September 14, 2009) Use of Special...

MetLife "SIGNIFICANT INCREASE in Structured Settlement Sales"

Posted on September 16, 2009
On the one year anniversary of the 2008 "epicenter of bad news", positive news is coming from MetLife. William J. Wheeler CFO of MetLife, Inc. said that Met is gaining market share in every one of its lines of business,...

"Yabba Dabba Doo" Insurance Company Needs To Get With The Times

Posted on September 16, 2009
Other commentators have waxed toxic of their disdain for casualty company approved lists. So, having been given the appropriate "stimulus" I've decided to weight in. One wonders what "dinosaur" of the structured settlement industry is advising a P&C company to...

Structured Annuity Issuer Customer Service...Areas To Improve-1-Policy Mailings

Posted on September 15, 2009
This author believes that the shorter the structured settlement sales cycle the more happy your customer will be. One thing that I have observed that needlessly extends the sales cycle is delivery of structured annuity contracts to settlement agents, brokers...

New York Insurance Compensation Disclosure Coming To a Head (Proposed Reg. 194 of 11 NYCRR 30)

Posted on September 14, 2009
The New York State Insurance Department (Department) has sent draft producer disclosure regulations to the Governor?s Office of Regulatory Reform (GORR) for review. GORR is meeting with and getting input from interested parties and could publish proposed regulations by late...

Rip-Off Report Complaint on Peachtree Settlement Funding "These B**ches Got His Money"

Posted on September 13, 2009
This piece of uncensored "fan mail" for Peachtree Settlement Funding appears on the Rip Off Report (#424073), an online bulletin board which enables consumers to sound off about companies who they feel have wronged them. "Paechtree (sic) is a ripoff....

NSSTA Position on "Promoting the CSSC" Certification

Posted on September 13, 2009
The National Structured Settlement Trade Association has posted a web page about "Promoting the CSSC", a settlement industry professional certification program that it administers. The page came about after conversations between officials at the University of Notre Dame and the...

Short Term Structured Settlements... Don't Get Snookered

Posted on September 13, 2009
Plaintiff attorneys should use caution when encountering a latter day defense tactic that still occasionally pops up in negotiations, involving pressuring the plaintiff into a structured settlement with payment terms of only a few years in the current environment...

She's Right, Sort Of

Posted on September 11, 2009
Patricia Laborde. Division Counsel from "cash now" pusher Stone Street Capital, publicly admits to enjoy reading this blog and I thank her for that. She recently made an attempt to hoist me on my own petard concerning the regulation of...

Structured Settlement "Seminal Text" promoted on Internet as " Helping People Transfer Payments From Their Structured Srttlements"

Posted on September 11, 2009
This in from one of our readers who alerted us to the following after reading yesterday's post Structured Settlement Annuity in One Wordy "Inarticulate Articulation"? "This also from Settlementblog.net on what I thought was the seminal text on our industry:...

Structured Settlement "Seminal Text" promoted on Internet as " Helping People Transfer Payments From Their Structured Settlements"

Posted on September 11, 2009
This in from one of our readers who alerted us to the following after reading yesterday's post Structured Settlement Annuity in One Wordy "Inarticulate Articulation"? "This also from Settlementblog.net on what I thought was the seminal text on our industry:...

Financial Rating Agencies Under Review on State and Federal Level

Posted on September 10, 2009
One year removed from the 2008 Fall "Vlasic", the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) announced that it will hold a public hearing on Sept. 24 to discuss the past and future roles of Nationally Recognized Statistical Ratings Organizations (NRSRO),...

Structured Settlement Annuity in One Wordy "Inarticulate Articulation"

Posted on September 10, 2009
"Structured settlement annuities are as a (sic) result of broadly articulating litigation that?s occurred between parties where a (sic) economic award has been given by one party to another as a (sic) result of a court action". Source: Settlementblog...

What Do 4structures.com, LLC and Forge Consulting Have in Common?

Posted on September 09, 2009
Check this out! I can praise as well as I can bash. In this post I would like to acknowledge that besides sharing a current or former client (or two), 4structures.com, LLC and Forge Consulting, LLC now share compliance with...

Lien Resolution and "Other Discounted Free Services" Tie In To Structured Settlements... Potential Pitfalls Exposed

Posted on September 09, 2009
In the last few months Ive notice that a number of licensed insurance agent or broker individuals or firms that are Partners For Justice with the New York State Trial Lawyers Association have begun to offer discounts for services. This...

Lack of Published Thought Contributes To S2KM High Bounce Rate

Posted on September 09, 2009
The "Bounce Rate" for readers of the S2KM blog "Beyond Structured Settlements" is ridiculously high for someone who is the author of what was once considered the seminal text for structured settlements. With a 1 month bounce rate of 73.5%,...

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