On Monday March 30th , the New York  Department of Financial Services issued a new policy that small businesses (less than 100 employees) may DEFER their premium payments for 60 Days if they are experiencing financial hardship due to COVID-19. The regulation just came out so details will need to be explained, but the basic concept is: 

For the next 60 days, without need to pay your insurance premiums, OR worry about insurance cancellations, you can keep your business open and staff employed, to the extent prudent.  We realize that this 60-day deferment does not address all the financial challenges our clients are facing, but perhaps it will help.

 

Keep in mind that these deferred premiums will be due down the road, so here are two other things you should consider:

 

1. Adjust Your Policy:

If your current polic ies (Liability, Workers Compensation, or others) are based on sales or payroll projections that are now unrealistic, please send revised projections to your Levitt-Fuirst Account Executive. With the revised projections, we will attempt to have your current policy adjusted to reflect your changes. Not all carriers will allow this change.

 

2. Put Carrier on Notice for Business Interruption (BI) Claim:

If you want to put your insurance carrier on-notice about a potential Business Interruption (BI) claim, p lease send an email to Gordon Sakow at [email protected] stating:

"We would like to put our insurance carrier on notice of loss of Business Income due to the Coronavirus outbreak.   Our losses began on X _________ (date) and continue through today."  

Please note: w e sent an eblast out a few weeks ago explaining that most insurance policies have an exclusion for Business Income losses caused by viruses (View Business Interruption eBlast). If you still want to put your insurance carrier on notice of a potential BI claim, please email Gordon.  There is building political pressure to force insurance companies to pay these claims , ev en though they are typically excluded.

We will continue to keep you informed of the changing insurance market place in reference to this crisis.