Florida Insurance Commissioner David Altmaier has recently spoken out about the claims regarding Hurricane Michael, which occurred almost one whole year ago. He claims that insurance companies have been paying claims on time, however he is aware of the claims that are still open, and how unhappy people are about this. He announced that there are over 18,000 claims from Hurricane Michael that are still open- however he spent little time discussing why there are so many claims that remain open. Altmaier explained that only 3,612 of the 18,000 cases were still open due to lawsuits, which leaves people to wonder what is happening with the other 14,388 cases.
Insurance companies, by law, are to pay claims within 90 days, but insurance companies typically are able to find ways around this law, allowing them more time. Because of the fact that this 90-day period begins after an estimate is made and settled on, insurance companies often take months just to provide an estimate- which is completely legal.
Altmaier says that not a single insurance company has violated any state statutes regarding these claims, and because of this, there have been close to no complaints that have been filed to insurance companies from officials.
Lawmaker Senator Tom Lee is still questioning what is going on regarding the open claims, and is requesting the full story- he believes that there must be some information missing. While we still do not know why these claims are open, we know that we have lawmakers such as Tom Lee who will ask these questions for us.
