OK dear Blog readers, get ready for some interesting news. Were you aware that there are two states where insurance fraud is NOT considered a crime? Virginia is one of them, and OREGON is the other! Frankly, that bothers and scares me. Insurance fraud is not a crime in Oregon? So, am I to assume that other state and federal laws will protect us against insurance fraud? Don’t think so. While it IS true that we have many laws and rules on the books regarding fraud, there is nothing that I can find that relates specifically to insurance contracts.
In addition, I have found no real way to report insurance fraud should I run into it, other than informing the insurer or producer directly. There is no state outlet to report insurance fraud! I’ve also noticed that there are a significant number of states that have NO state fraud bureau for any purpose:
- Alabama
- Illinois
- Indiana
- Kansas
- Maine
- Michigan
- Oregon
- Vermont
- Wisconsin
- Wyoming
For additional information on these states and insurance fraud in general, there is a ton of information at the Insurance Information Institute (III) For info specific to fraud on the III’s website, click HERE. This is important to get on, as insurance fraud, according to some sources, accounts for roughly 10% of all insurance premium costs!
Please report insurance fraud to the proper authorities, as it’s costing all of us! Please let me know if you have any particular horrific (or stupid) insurance fraud stories…I will publish the best of them in the blog!