Anne Geggis
Griping that Floridians only have three hours a day to lodge complaints about their property insurer via the state’s consumer hotline led the state to open up another hour on the line, officials say.
The day after the Tampa Bay Times ran the story about the decreased hours of the state’s “insurance consumer helpline” since Hurricane Ian hit, the state announced that this week, starting Monday, the hotline would begin taking calls at 8 a.m.
But don’t wait until lunch hour to try to get through. The consumer hotline (877-MY-FL-CFO), that’s part of state law under the Homeowner Claims Bill of Rights, shuts down at noon. So it’s going to be taking calls for a total of 20 hours a week, Monday through Friday.
But the recording on the hotline playing on Monday doesn’t reflect the update hours. It still says it’s taking calls starting at 9 a.m.
Democratic Rep. Hillary Cassel slammed the announced one-hour extension as “tone deaf” and “insulting” to Floridians struggling to get their insurance companies to treat them fairly and pay what they owe. She had strong words for Gov. Ron DeSantis and the Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis.
“This crisis fell on DeSantis and Patronis’ watch and they can only be bothered to help for four hours a day,” said Cassel, who often represents businesses and individuals in claims against their insurers.
With Ian’s toll at 156 deaths and $112 billion in damages, people are still trying to move on with their lives, Cassel said.
“Meanwhile, insurance companies are looking to raise rates by up to 60% on homeowners and over 100% on condo owners,” Cassel wrote in a text. “This one-hour increase is further evidence that they don’t have solutions to the insurance crisis hurting Floridians’ pocketbooks.”
A full-time crisis needs a full-time hotline, Cassel said.
A spokesman for the agency that runs the hotline, the Department of Financial Services says even though the hotline might not be at full strength, other outreach has been occurring.
The department is getting 68% of the requests for assistance through email and its website, state officials said. Also, state officials said in-person help was increased in the affected areas with help centers set up in Fort Myers and Port Charlotte, where 40,000 policyholders were helped.
Also, personnel from the National Flood Insurance Program, the Florida Association of Public Insurance Adjusters, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) have been on scene, meeting with policyholders in Punta Gorda, Englewood and Fort Myers in what the department calls “insurance villages.” Another such village will be held three different days this month.
From 9 a.m. to 5 p.m, April 17 and April 19, the village will be at the Charlotte County Event Center, 75 Taylor Street in Punta Gorda. It will be in Fort Myers at the Diamondhead Beach Resort Ballroom, 2000 Estero Blvd. during the same hours on April 18.
In the last set of “insurance village” events in January, 13 insurance companies cut $5.4 million worth of insurance claim checks, state officials said.
