ProSight Blog

After a five-year slump, the construction industry is anticipating a strong summer just as FEMA funds reach homeowners affected by Hurricane Sandy. Now is the time for ProSight to team up with the Construction Managers Association of America (CMAA) and offer construction managers first-in-class coverage exclusively endorsed by CMAA.

Our customers are the inspiration behind ProSight’s approach to developing and delivering innovative insurance solutions. When we’re building our insurance products from the ground up, we strive to create products and services that go above and beyond the industry standard. Why? Because we understand the unique needs of our customers and realize the importance of providing innovative, value-added benefits that customers demand.

No one understands the concept of the phrase, “time is money” better that an attorney. With so many extracurricular functions that find their way onto a lawyer’s crowded schedule, it’s hard to make a case for joining yet another professional association—chipping away at precious billable hours.

When it comes to making a case for renewing your bar association membership, don’t think of it as another time wasting obligation, but an investment in your professional development. Not only will your membership provide you with the exposure to build your client base, but help you build a leaner, smarter practice, sharpen your skills, develop new areas of practice and even jump start your career.    

A common misconception of people without experience working in the non-profit sector is that non-profit organizations are low stress or even no-stress environments. The fact is that work-related stress can and does arise in for-profit as well as non-profit organizations. Non-profit leaders should consider ways to reduce employee stress and prevent burnout as part of an overall commitment to risk management. By taking a proactive approach, you’re not only building a healthier work force, but also reducing the probability of stress related insurance claims.   

ProSight Specialty invited Melanie Herman, Executive Director of the Nonprofit Risk Management Center to comment on the consequences of stress and share her recommendations for managing stress in the workplace. 

For today’s general contractor, construction risk management involves more than enhancing safety on the job site. It needs to cover all aspects of a company’s business, from the initial contract documents to operations and post-construction. Implementing risk management practices can help the general contractor:

• Protect assets
• Control insurance costs
• Preserve limits of insurance
• Reduce the chance of being involved in protracted legal disputes

While the overall housing sector is just starting to emerge from its long slump, unit sales in manufactured housing communities have grown more than 30 percent since 2009. And even though there are similarities between these properties and other kinds of real estate, there are several differences that owners should consider as they determine their insurance needs. Propel and ProSight have identified some of the major differences between manufactured housing communities and conventional housing developments - and what these differences mean in terms of protection and liability.

It has often been said, “You only get once chance to make a first impression.” For lawyers applying or renewing their malpractice insurance, the first impression of you and your firm is represented in the professional liability application.  The application process has become extremely important when applying for or renewing professional malpractice insurance coverage. Why? Because a good insurer will want to form a partnership with you and your firm, so it’s critical to make the extra effort to begin the relationship on the right foot by fully and disclosing information about your firm. Keep in mind that the more information underwriting has, the better they’ll be able to understand and rate the risk to better protect you and your firm. 

There's an old joke that dog bites only make the news if the headline is "Man Bites Dog." Unfortunately, when people who live in or visit manufactured housing communities are attacked by animals owned by residents, it's no laughing matter. That's because operators of these properties can face significant insurance risks if injured parties can show that the community owner was at fault.

Tangram Insurance Services and ProSight Specialty Insurance have created the Community Giving Fund to help support deserving non-profit organizations. One of the recent recipients of a grant from the fund is the San Francisco Child Abuse Prevention Center (SFCAPC) which has worked for almost 40 years to prevent child abuse. The organization traces its roots back to the founding of the San Francisco Child Abuse Council in 1973 by the Chief of Pediatrics at San Francisco General Hospital; in 1998 the council merged with the TALK Line Family Support Center to create the SFCAPC.

The DVD may be dying — witness the recent decline of Blockbuster chains — but the good news for the film industry is that with 75% of the population possessing Smartphones and/or Internet access, Video-on-Demand (VOD) films are quickly replacing the DVD as the primary alternative to watching movies in the theater.

With online streaming venues, from Netflix to iTunes offering original content and made-for-streaming movies, such as 2012’s Mel Gibson release, “Get the Gringo,” audiences can now find premium entertainment without even having to traipse out to the video store or wait for a DVD to arrive in the mail.

So what does this mean for the film industry?  

Well, because Direct-to-VOD films might have smaller budgets, and quicker turn-around times, that means film producers need to have their production needs met with more rapid fire solutions.