South Florida customers of Heritage Property & Casualty can stop worrying about property insurance rate increases as high as 25 percent.
The company on Tuesday withdrew a rate request that would have increased the price of insuring a single-family home by an average of 14.9 percent statewide, including 21.4 percent in the Fort Lauderdale area and 25 percent in coastal areas of Broward and Palm Beach counties. The increases would have taken effect Sept. 1.
Heritage President Richard Widdicombe said in an interview Wednesday that the company could not reach agreement with the state Office of Insurance Regulation over policy revisions aimed at minimizing losses from assignment of benefits abuses. Without that agreement, there was no way to determine how rates should be set, he said.
“We want some clarity as to how we as a business can address assignment of benefits,” he said. “We went back and forth negotiating with them but couldn’t reach an agreement.”
