FL Governor Rick Scott Takes on PIP Fraud

On October 3^rd, Florida’s governor Rick Scott met with constituents at the Orlando Police Department Gun and Training Center to discuss concerns about personal injury protection (PIP) and auto insurance in Florida.

As reported by WESH News, PIP coverage is an insurance that Florida drivers are required to have that pays a policyholder for bodily injury damages that occurred due to an accident by providing them payment for medical and hospital expenses, child care expenses, loss of services and funeral expenses.

In a separate report from WOFL News, Scott says that the program is full of fraud, and that it is pretty much a tax on local residents.

“This is a tax. Because you live in Florida and because we have a law that’s been improperly used, it costs more to live in our state.

In 2010 alone, insurance companies paid out $2.7 billion in PIP claims, which is an increase of $900 million from the year before. State leaders blame the increase on insurance fraud.

A representative for Scott stated that auto insurance premiums will increase by 29% for Florida consumers each year until something is done to fix PIP fraud. And even though there has been a decrease in the number of crashes, the representative noted that the number of personal injury protection claims and the costs of those claims have climbed.

Scott stated that personal injury protection reform is a legislative priority.

“Some people just want to get rid of PIP. Other people want to make sure it’s easier to investigate staged accidents, make it easier to stop people from being able to jump in and act like they were in an accident. Make sure that it’s easier for the insurance companies to question whether or not a provider is doing the right thing, those are things we are talking about.”

Personal injury attorneys and lawyer referral services were also given part of the blame by some members of a panel that the Governor met with. Governor Scott is not saying we should get rid of PIP insurance entirely for now, but he does plan to concentrate on solutions when the Legislature meets in January, hoping that will bring down car insurance rates for consumers.

Scott’s visit happened to come on the same day that five people were arrested by the Division of Insurance Fraud in Orlando for staging auto accidents to get the insurance payout.

Governor Scott to take on PIP fraud: MyFoxORLANDO.com