Life Insurance Consumer Advocacy Center

The California Department of Insurance (CDI) has repeatedly denied LICAC’s lawful and proper Public Records Act requests for statistics in CDI’s possession on complaints by California consumers concerning life insurance and annuities. The requested information concerns the number and types of such complaints as well as reports and data that were used in the preparation of the tables and data presented in the California Insurance Commissioner’s statutorily required Annual Report.

LICAC has requested this data to assist its efforts to advocate for consumers of life insurance, including annuities, and to work for passage of laws and regulations that protect life insurance consumers. The statistics requested by LICAC are important information that could be used to establish a baseline against which to compare complaints in the future. Among other things the baseline would reveal whether the recently enacted SB 263 (Dodd) reduces or increases the number of complaints by consumers. Consumer groups including LICAC opposed SB 263 because it allows agents to falsely tell consumers that the agent has no conflicts of interest with the consumer and that the agent is obligated to make only recommendations that are in the best interest of the consumer.

LICAC first requested the information on August 18, 2024. View the letter HERE. CDI responded on August 21, 2024, claiming that it “does not have responsive information as it does not maintain any reports that would provide the data or statistics you are seeking.”  View the email chain HERE.

LICAC responded on August 24, 2024, pointing out that CDI obviously did possess the requested information because the Insurance Commissioner’s 2023 Annual Report contains charts showing the total number of complaints about life insurance and annuities as well as a separate chart showing the “Top Ten Types of Complaint Reasons.” The chart showing the types of complaints aggregates complaints across all lines of coverage, but since CDI also publishes the number of complaints by line of coverage (e.g., life insurance and annuities), CDI necessarily possesses raw data showing the number and types of complaints submitted by consumers regarding life insurance and annuities.  Accordingly, LICAC modified its Public Records Act request to track the categories of data contained in the Commissioner’s 2023 Annual Report.

CDI responded on September 9, 2024, again refusing to provide the requested data and claiming that “the data sought aside from what is published [in the Annual Report] is not maintained by the Department.”  This statement is obviously false since CDI necessarily maintains the underlying data and reports from which the charts in the Annual Report were generated.  Thus, LICAC modified its Public Records Act request again, this time to include “All reports and data that were used in the preparation of the tables and data presented at page 78 of the Commission’s 2023 Annual Report.”

On October 9, 2024, CDI finally admitted that it possessed the requested data.  But now it offered a new reason for refusing to provide it:  “Please be advised that any reports and data that were used in preparation of the tables and data presented at page 78 of the Commissioner’s 2023 Annual Report are confidential and not disclosable pursuant to Insurance Code section 12919, Evidence Code section 1040, Government Code sections 7927.500,  7929.00, 7927.705, and 7922.00, and the deliberative process privilege.”

CDI did not attempt to explain why its boilerplate list of privileges applied to LICAC’s request, despite the clear language of Government Code Section 7922.000, which provides,

An agency shall justify withholding any record by demonstrating that the record in question is exempt under express provisions of this division, or that on the facts of the particular case the public interest served by not disclosing the record clearly outweighs the public interest served by disclosure of the record.

LICAC followed up on October 28, 2024, and November 8, 2024, pointing out that under Section 7922.000, CDI cannot simply invoke privileges but must demonstrate that they apply to LICAC’s request.  CDI responded on November 8, 2024, reiterating its refusal to provide any information and again failing to demonstrate or explain how the claimed privileges apply to LICAC’s request.

CDI’s efforts to hide the requested consumer complaint data is perhaps not surprising given the Commissioner’s shameful abandonment of California annuity consumers when it agreed with insurance industry lobbyists’ rewriting of SB 263 from the pro-consumer bill CDI initially proposed to the virulently anti-consumer bill that ended up getting passed.  See LICAC blog posts dated 2/23/24, 2/22/24, 2/15/24, 1/17,24, 11/16/23, 10/3/23, and 8/28/23.  Nevertheless, CDI’s efforts to hide the requested data are inexcusable and clearly violate the California Public Records Act and Government Code Section 7922.000.

 

Read the press release HERE.