SB 888: Professional Services Contracts
SB 888 would expand Florida’s homeowners’ insurance transparency requirements by requiring residential property insurers to submit a “rate transparency report” with any rate filing seeking a change in homeowners’ coverage rates. The report must be written in concise, plain language and include a graphical breakdown of the main factors driving the requested rate, such as reinsurance, claims, defense and containment costs, fees and commissions, and insurer profit and contingency. The Office of Insurance Regulation (OIR) could accept the report for filing or return it for modification if it is misleading or not sufficiently clear, but acceptance would not count as approval of the rate filing.
The bill also requires insurers to provide the report to consumers with offers of coverage and at renewal, and to label it as preliminary if the office has not yet accepted or modified it. In addition, OIR would have to define technical terms used in the report in plain language to help consumers understand the information. The bill is aimed at making rate-setting more understandable to policyholders and increasing visibility into how homeowners’ premiums are built.
The bill would amend section 627.0621, Florida Statutes, to add new transparency duties for residential property insurers and new public-information obligations for the Office of Insurance Regulation. It would require a comprehensive consumer resource center on OIR’s website, including market data, insurer contact information, educational materials, mitigation and discount information, claims-process guidance, consumer complaint resources, Citizens Property Insurance Corporation takeout information, and public access to rate-filing materials and related insurer information. The bill also declares certain rate-filing information, including statewide average requested and approved rate changes and county rating examples, not to be trade secrets and not subject to specified public-records exemptions.
The available record suggests the bill was generally framed as a consumer-protection and transparency measure, with an emphasis on helping homeowners understand insurance pricing and the market. There are no committee transcripts or recorded votes in the provided materials, so there is no documented opposition or support to characterize beyond the bill’s text and procedural history. The bill ultimately died in Rules, indicating it did not advance to final passage.
The main policy tension in the bill is between consumer transparency and insurer confidentiality. The bill requires disclosure of rate drivers, affiliate use, and certain filing data, and expressly removes trade-secret protection from some rate information, which could concern insurers and affiliated entities. Another point of potential contention is the breadth of OIR’s new website and reporting obligations, which would expand regulatory workload and public disclosure of rate-setting assumptions, while supporters would likely view those requirements as necessary for consumer understanding and accountability.