Car insurance fraud spiked in Florida as drivers wrecked their cars deliberately to file medical claims, according to an announcement from an industry group today.
Staged car accidents skyrocketed 58 percent in 2009 to 1,999, according to the National Insurance Crime Bureau’s statement today. Tampa had the worst problem, with intentional collisions quadrupling to 487, the organization said.
“South Florida used to be the focal point of these deliberate crashes,” said NICB President Joe Wehrle in a statement. “While the Miami and Hialeah areas continue to show increased activity, the criminals have expanded their operation northward and Tampa is now at the epicenter of this crime.”
United States auto insurers, an organization headed by State Farm Mutual Auto Insurance Company, Allstate Corporation, and Geico are trying to find physicians who manage the largest number of claims flagged for fraud. Car insurance fraud for bodily injury coverage cost the business $4.8 billion to $6.8 billion in 2007, and the cost has risen since as far back as 2002, explained David Corum, the vice president for the Insurance Research Council.
Florida has the largest rates for personal-injury-protection and bodily-injury fraud in the NICB’s review of the 12 states that permit people to receive reimbursement for collisions without evidence of fault, the bureau reported. The number of claims suspected of fraud rose 15 percent in Florida in 2009 to 7,447 compared with 2008, the group reported.
The economic crisis in Florida may exacerbate auto insurance fraud, according to the NICB. Florida has an unemployment rate of 11.7 percent as of May, compared to the national rate of 9.7 percent, and is close to the highest rate the state has seen in decades.
Florida Leads the Pack
“Florida is way out in front of the rest of the country in the number of questionable claims submitted,” explained Ron Poindexter, NICB’s director of operations in the southeastearn U.S. “There is a link between the downturn in the economy and the increase in all types of insurance fraud.”
Nationally, reports of casualty car insurance claims from staged accidents rose 43 percent in 2009, according to a statement the NICB made in February.
Source: InsuranceRate.com
