Movies Under the Stars!

One of the great traditions of summer is the outdoor movie. You bring a blanket, a picnic, and, yes, even a jacket and settle in for a classic movie. Tonight, the City of Edmonds is showing the first of their two outdoor movies this summer: "Horton Hears a Who".

At dusk, an inflatable movie screen will be set up on the field at the Frances Anderson Center and the film will start. Bring family and friends to this blockbuster film. And if you can't make it, there's always "Ghostbusters" next weekend, or google outdoor movies.

The Frances Anderson Center is located at 700 Main Street in Edmonds (same venue as the Edmonds Arts Festival).

Let's Get Down to Business...

Around here, we like to think of ourselves as your one-stop insurance resource. We've compiled a website with useful information, created a newsletter with tips, tricks and insurance information and we even send out a calendar once a year to help you keep track of your busy life. But what we don't often mention is that we insure families, cars, homes AND businesses.

Many of our clients insure their personal lives and their professional lives with our office. Because they do, we can make sure that there aren't any dangerous gaps in their coverages. If you are willing to trust us with your family, wouldn't you trust us with your business? And we'd like to think the reverse would hold true as well.

Basically, if you are one of our business clients, we'd welcome the opportunity to see if we can protect your home, autos and family with the same care and consideration we have for your business. And if you own a business, or are thinking of starting your own company, let us know! We'd be more than happy to look through any protection options we can provide for you.

When You Travel Do You Need Special Insurance?

With the political climate in some countries and the financial implications or traveling to others, people are more aware of travel risks. One question that comes up repeatedly is the need for travel insurance. When traveling abroad, this issue takes on a new kind of importance. There are two primary types of travel-related coverage: one that is common called "travel insurance" and covers the cost of cancelled or interrupted travel, and can often reimburse unexpected expenses for changes in travel plans. The second type of coverage is for medical costs, should you become ill while outside the United States.

Fortunately for travelers, the option to buy travel coverage is abundant...when you book flights, hotels, tours and rental cars you are often offered the travel insurance. Unfortunately, the explanations those venues offer are often less clear. Here's what Trusted Choice, an insurance association and resource, has to say about travel insurance in their article "When You Travel, Do You Need Special Insurance?":

"Travel insurance covers the loss of the prepaid travel costs of a trip should it be canceled, interrupted, or postponed. It also can reimburse unexpected expenses incurred due to a sudden change in travel plans due to illness or other causes. Specialty medical coverage protects against personal insurance risks when someone is outside the United States.

Travelers can buy travel coverage in conjunction with their travel tour, hotel bookings or flight reservations. It's also available from providers that specialize in the international insurance market. For example, Continental, a major international airline, offers trip cancellation and interruption coverage through its reservations website. The coverage reimburses the travel for "prepaid, unused, non-refundable travel expenses should your trip be cancelled or interrupted due to any covered reason." Such reasons include: inclement weather, an unexpected illness, death of a traveler, and travel delays.

Trip Interruption insurance is another variation. It can provide reimbursement for extra food and lodgings if a traveler becomes ill during the course of a trip. Some plans cover medical costs. Trip delay insurance covers expenses a traveler incurs in resuming a planned trip or returning home after being quarantined in another county. Often, these various coverages are bundled and sold together in a package.

Short-term medical insurance may be appropriate for the millions of U.S. residents who travel outside the U.S. every year. Those who travel outside of America may be going beyond the boundaries of their medical insurance without knowing it, according to Clements International, a provider of international insurance policies.

The unpredictable nature of the spreading of swine flu that began in April 2009 has heightened awareness of health risks while traveling around the world. Travelers may wish to consider short-term medical insurance if they're traveling outside of the United States for an extended vacation or business trip. To determine whether it's necessary, it's advisable to check if a domestic health insurance policy covers out-of-country travel. If not, short-term medical insurance provides coverage for illnesses or medical evacuations that occur while traveling outside of the United States."

Often international travelers face the same insurance risks while outside the country that they do stateside, but those insurance policies may not transfer exactly. It is always best to double check your policies to make sure they are covering you when and where you'll be going. As always, if you have any questions, feel free to give us a call!

Uninsured Drivers Are on the Rise

In case you haven't noticed, the economy is in a downturn. While we've all heard about the loss of jobs, the falling housing prices in some areas, and the general malaise of the financial forecast, there is another downside to today's economic climate. Unfortunately, more and more drivers are driving uninsured, or underinsured.

According to a recent study from Insurance Research Council, about one in six drivers across the United States may be driving uninsured. If you look around you on any given day, how many drivers could be on the road with you without enough insurance protection? This means responsible drivers who purchase insurance that is appropriate for their situation may end up paying for injuries caused by uninsured drivers.

If you haven't reviewed your liability coverages lately, now might be a good time to revisit them. We are always more than happy to look over your auto policy to make sure that you have the coverage you need on today's roads. And we can often increase your coverages without a significant increase in premiums. Just let us know!

Identity Thieves are STILL Hard at Work!

These days, everyone has heard about identity theft. Our office even hosts an annual shredding event to offer added protection about the damaging crime. While the publicity surrounding how to prevent identity theft has increased over the past few years, the amount of identity theft hasn't decreased. Rather, there are new ways that identity thieves are working to "borrow" people's identities. MetLife Auto and Home did some research and came up with a few new ways identity theft is happening...and not all of them are all that obvious.

- Medical Identity Theft: Thieves take the identity of a person to obtain medical services and treatments. They might also try to forge insurance claims or falsify medical information for monetary gain. The scary part with this type of crime is that the medical information that the thief provides under you name may end up in your permanent file - meaning that in an acute medical emergency you may be treated based on fraudulent information!

- Identity of a Newborn or Underage Child: Because young children don't often need their social security numbers, or credit scores, this area of crime is especially attractive since it may take years until the child or parents realize anything is amiss.

- Reporting for Duty: Despite the fact that our armed forces provide vital protections and services for our county, the fact that they are abroad makes them an easier target for identity thieves. Having several countries between themselves and the thieves creates a delay in noticing that anything is wrong.

- Moving to a New Home: When you move from apartment to home, or to a new home, there are often mountains of mail that appear at either end. The sensitive mail that ends up in the mix can create opportunities for confusion, and increases the risk that personal information can fall into the wrong hands.

- Let's Get Together...Or Not. For engaged couples, newlyweds and those that have entered into a civil union, name and address changes are common. With that comes the consolidation of credit and other accounts. The reverse often happens during a divorce or separation. With all of the paperwork flying around, sensitive information is in the mix and the identity thieves can sneak in and get the information they need to defraud you.

- The Loss of a Loved One: As unfeeling as it sounds, unscrupulous individuals may attempt to take over the identity of a recently deceased person for financial gain. That may mean that the surviving relatives are forced to deal with a financial catastrophe while they are trying to mourn a loved one.

- Traveling Overseas: Discovering the world and encountering different cultures can be exciting but there are possible financial problems that could arise. Losing your passport, driver's license or credit cards in a foreign country can open the door to identity theft that is trickier to discover since you are far away from home.

Consider this a friendly reminder to keep an eye on those documents with your sensitive personal information. Identity theft is a difficult crime to recover from, and while some insurance companies offer recovery services, the emotional and financial damage can take a toll on individuals. For more information, visit your state's attorney general's website - they usually have plentiful resources for identity theft prevention.

Edmonds in Bloom this Weekend!

Every year the best of the best gardens in Edmonds participate in the Edmonds in Bloom Garden Tour. This Sunday, June 17th, is the Garden Tour. The "Rhythm and Blooms" tour beigns this weekend, and you can purchase tickets at any number of local businesses. Visit www.edmondsinbloom.com for more information!

And be sure to stop by the new frozen yogurt place if you end up in downtown Edmonds after touring the gorgeous gardens on display in this year's competition. Revelations Yogurt has become a favorite in our office - mix, match and taste away. This new treasure is located at 527 Main Street - just across the street from Epulo Bistro. Chances are you'll run into one of us while you're there...

Have a great weekend!

Cell Phone Stolen? Who Foots the Bill?

What started out as a luxury has now become, for most, a necessity. Ask anyone who's lost a cell phone exactly how they felt when it was missing, damaged, or otherwise rendered unusable. There are over 250 MILLION cell phones in the United States alone, and if history proves true, over a half a million of them will be in the hands of cell phone thieves in the next year. Scary, right?

Feelings of confusion, violation and lack-of-connectedness aside, cell phone theft is not a cheap crime. Because many cell phone contracts make the owners responsible for all charges to their phone (though some policies vary depending on when and how you report your phone borrowed sans permission) thieves can take advantage of that - to the tune of thousands of dollars. For anyone who has ever gone over their minute limit or text allowance, charges for extras on the phone plans add up quickly. Unfortunately, those costs (the ones from the thieves downloading each and every Harry Potter or Star Warsmovie under the sun, for example) are rarely covered by your homeowners insurance.

Homeowners policies are designed to cover "direct physical loss" - or something actually happening to you. This means that the insurance could cover the new device itself, but you are still stuck paying for the downloaded movies, umpteen text messages and a variety of marathon-length phone calls. Charges resulting from the usage of the phone aren't covered.

Even the cell phone carriers' insurance plans may not cover you for the usage charges. Like homeowners insurance, they might just help you buy a new device. Since having one's phone stolen is not only a common reality, but a very spendy situation, it is important to safeguard your phone from thieves, know how to report a theft (or missing phone in general) and report it missing as soon as you are sure that it is gone for good. Trusted Choice (a national insurance association) received some tips from best-selling author David Bach of The Automatic Millionaire to avoid being on the hook for a monster bill from a stolen phone:

1) Use Password Protection. Most phones, especially the smart ones, include a programmable password feature that requires a password to be entered to even begin to use the phone.

2) Call your Provider the Second you Discover the Loss: Most contracts make the owner responsible for all charges that occur before the loss is reported. Therefore the time of reporting could save thousands of dollars in unwanted charges. While reporting the loss, keep track of the date and time of the call, as well as the name of the persons taking the report. That could be valuable information in the even your provider continues to charge you after you filed the claim.

3) File a Police Report. While very few stolen phones are actually recovered, a police report creates an official record of the crime, and some phone companies do require a police report to proceed.

4) If You Feel Your Provider is Being Unreasonable, Tell Them You Request an Investigation. This could help you avoid collections and delay reporting to the credit bureaus. When you request the investigation, inform the provider that you are filing complaints with the FCC, your state's Attorney General's Office, and the state's Public Utilities Commission.

5) If Your Provider Continues to Act Unreasonably, Contact the Three Resources Above. Complaints can usually be filed by calling the consumer hot lines or through their websites.

While we hope you never have your phone stolen, we want you to have some tips, tricks and resources to help curb the damage.