FAQ & Expert Answers

Cybersecurity insurance protects businesses against financial losses caused by incidents like data breaches and theft, system hacking, ransomware extortion payments, and more. Given the prevalence of online storage of financial and sensitive information, most organizations, including those seeking nonprofit insurance, should carry cyber liability coverage. If you’d like to better understand how to protect your organization from cybercrime, contact us and one of our experts can provide some guidance.

Each state has their own rules and regulations on what they consider statutory or the minimum requirements. However, those limits may not adequately protect your organization and its assets properly. Additionally, many funders/grantors have a different definition of what they consider to be the minimum requirements. In general, Lamb often recommends at least $1M in Liability coverage across all lines of business, as well as Excess Liability to further protect your organization. This is particularly important when evaluating insurance for human service organizations, where risks and exposure levels may vary widely depending on the services offered.

Yes, you do. Special event insurance is an insurance policy that helps protect your investment in a specific event, such as a gala or fundraiser. Event insurance may help cover your costs if you unexpectedly need to cancel your event or if you’re found responsible for property damage or an injury caused during your event.

There are a number of factors that are currently driving increases in insurance costs. At the industry level, insurance costs are rising due to such things such as the cost of recent natural disasters, the increasing frequency of litigation, increases in settlement/verdict payouts, etc. While those may be outside of your control, there are a number of important factors that you can influence that will minimize or eliminate potential premium increases. The most important of which are your organization’s recent loss experience as well as actions your organization has taken to anticipate and reduce factors that cause risk. Lamb has a number of blogs addressing how you can reduce your risk.

For more detail on the current cost trends in the insurance market, see “The Hard Market Explained” on our insights page.

Whether you live inside or outside of the high-risk flood area, if you own property you should consider purchasing flood insurance for the protection and peace of mind it brings. Every property is vulnerable to flooding. However, many property owners, particularly those in high-risk flood areas, may be required to have flood insurance. To better understand your risks and the insurance options available, please contact one of our experts.

Lamb’s fax number is 888-389-8061

Lamb’s mailing address is 420 Lexington Avenue, Suite 2620, New York, NY 10170.

No, Lamb is an insurance broker. The role of a broker is to work with the insurance carrier on your behalf. Our mission is to find the best carrier for each client based on their specific needs, including coverage, limits, and premiums, especially for those seeking nonprofit insurance or insurance for human service organizations.

At Lamb Insurance Services, we make filing a claim quick and easy. Simply go to our website (www.lambis.com) and click “Submit a Claim” in the upper righthand corner, then complete the incident report form as prompted. Our team of claims analysts will take it from there.

Lamb Insurance Services offers an enhanced customer service experience by introducing new online service options. The Lamb Client Portal offers you secure access to your insurance information online 24/7 from a computer or mobile device. These services are available to you at no additional cost, and provides a variety of added services including reviewing and downloading your current invoices, online bill-pay, and reviewing and downloading any active cancellation or reinstatement notices. Your assigned Account Manager or Service Hub is able to assist with any billing questions as well.

Yes! Our goal at Lamb Insurance Services is to exceed client expectations. This means providing you with service options that are available 24/7, mobile, and fast. You can access your insurance information from any device, just search “Lamb Insurance” in the Google Play Store or Apple App Store to get started with our Mobile App.

Lamb Insurance Services offers an enhanced customer service experience by introducing new online service options. The Lamb Client Portal offers you secure access to your insurance information online 24/7 from a computer or mobile device. These services are available to you at no additional cost and provide a variety of added services including reviewing and downloading your current invoices, online bill-pay, downloading already issued certificates, and reviewing and downloading a copy of your policies.

Lamb Insurance Services offers an enhanced customer service experience by introducing new online service options. The Lamb Client Portal offers you secure access to your insurance information online 24/7 from a computer or mobile device. These services are available to you at no additional cost and provide a variety of added services including reviewing and downloading your current invoices, online bill-pay, downloading policies, and reviewing and downloading already issued certificates, as well as requesting a new one.

Lamb Insurance Services offers an enhanced customer service experience by introducing new online service options. The Lamb Client Portal offers you secure access to your insurance information online 24/7 from a computer or mobile device. These services are available to you at no additional cost, and provides a variety of added services including reviewing and downloading your current invoices, online bill-pay, downloading policies, reviewing and downloading already issued certificates, and reviewing and downloading your automobile ID cards.

Blanket AI is an “additional insured” endorsement. It is an insurance policy endorsement that automatically provides coverage to any party to which the named insured is contractually required to provide additional insurance coverage. If you are a Lamb client, please consult with your Account Manager or the Service Hub to review your policy together.

This is a very complex topic in which the answer varies state by state. Please consult with your Client Executive or Account Manager to understand your state’s exact requirements. If you are not a client of Lamb but would like expert adviceon insurance for human service organizations, please contact us.

To learn more about the risk involved with utilizing volunteers at your organization, read this.

Non-owned and hired auto coverage will provide liability coverage for injuries or damages you cause in an accident. Liability risks exist whether an employee uses their own vehicle for business purposes, rents a vehicle, or uses a company owned vehicle. This can be helpful if the vehicle owner’s liability limits are too low to fully cover the incident, or if your organization is denied coverage under the owner’s policy. If your organization frequently borrows vehicles, uses car-sharing services, utilizes employee cars, or rents vehicles, this coverage would be strongly recommended.

Quote times vary between one day and a week or more. In general, the complexity of the coverage drives that answer. Assuming you have provided all of the information needed for a quote (loss runs, applications, etc.), the most common policy types take 5 to 10 business days.

While you can always request a quote online by visiting our website and completing a few quick questions, we are partnering with a number of our carriers to enable a full online rate/quote/bind process. We expect to provide some exciting options in the latter half of 2023.

You can ensure your organization is covered by having an appropriate legal contract with the third party that ensures they have adequate risk-transfer and insurance coverage. For larger risk instances such as new building construction, an organization can insulate itself from additional claims by purchasing specialized insurance products such as an Owners Interest General Liability policy.

Lamb does not sell personal insurance lines. We sometimes service personal lines that have come to us through mergers and acquisitions of other agencies, but we do not write new lines of personal business.

First, move your vehicle from the roadway to a safer place if it is operable. Call the police if there have been any bodily injuries to your passengers or the other vehicle’s passengers, do not leave the scene of the accident prior to the police’s arrival. Exchange insurance information with other parties and do not admit fault for the accident. Be certain to report the claim via our “Submit a Claim” link in the upper righthand corner of Lambis.com.

Insurance carriers encourage the reporting of all incidents that could give rise to a claim, and most do not penalize a policyholder for submitting “record-only” claims. Doing this preserves your rights under the policy in the event that the incident eventually develops into a claim (e.g., if a pedestrian slips and falls on your property, but denies medical attention, it’s usually prudent to submit a record-only incident to protect your interests in the event of a future lawsuit.)

When hiring an employee who will be required to drive on company business, there are some critical actions to be taken to ensure qualified and safe drivers are put behind the wheel, which include but are not limited to:

• Establish criteria for determining Motor Vehicle Record (“MVR”) acceptability. (e.g., No major violations in the past 5 years, no more than 2 preventable accidents in the last 3 years, etc). Ultimately, the organization will need to strike a balance of driver qualifications and organizational risk management in developing the criteria.
• Review of the candidate’s MVR abstract for at least the past 5 years.
• Acknowledgement by candidate of driver safety policy
• Road test and driver safety training
• Completion of medical certification and negative drug test results (this applies to commercial driver license (CDL) drivers.)

There are five key elements to a successful abuse prevention program:

– Awareness training
– Skillful applicant screening
– Established policies & procedures
– Background checks
– Program monitoring and oversight

Lamb has partnered with Abuse Prevention Systems (https://abusepreventionsystems.com/) to offer clients a wide range of resources to prevent abuse in their organizations.

For additional information on Abuse and Molestation coverage, read this “Abuse and Molestation Coverage” article on our industry insights page.

Code Rule 59 is a New York specific program administered by the New York Department of Labor (NYDOL). Employers with annual payrolls greater than $800,000 and an experience modification rating (“EMR”) above 1.20 are required to participate in a comprehensive safety consultation by a NYDOL approved safety and loss prevention consultant. Failure to comply with the program in a timely manner results in a 5% surcharge on your workers’ compensation insurance premium. Lamb has certified NYDOL safety and loss prevention consultants on staff and can assist clients who are subject to the Code Rule 59 program.

Unlike Code Rule 59, which is mandatory for certain New York employers, Code Rule 60 is a voluntary program that offers eligible New York employers insurance premium credits. Credits are available for New York self-insured employers and insured New York employers whose EMR is less than 1.30 and whose annual workers’ compensation premiums are at least $5,000. Employers can get credits by starting one or more workplace programs designed to decrease injuries and reduce workers’ compensation costs, including:

– Workplace safety
– Drug and alcohol prevention
– Return-to-work

While the above is applicable specifically to New York State, other states have similar programs. For more information on your state, please contact one of our experts. Lamb has certified Safety and Loss Prevention Consultants on staff and can assist.

More on Optimizing premium credits & avoiding penalties

More on Understanding New York Code Rule 59 and 60

An experience modification rating (ex mod or EMR) is a multiplier that is applied to insurance premiums for specific policy types (most often workers’ compensation) and based upon your organization’s losses compared to your peers. An exmod of 1.0 is average. In general, anything above 1.0 will increase your premiums, anything below will reduce your premiums.

Working to create a safer work environment through loss control and risk management, in concert with reporting claims quickly (and closing them out quickly) are examples of elements within your control that can have a significant positive impact on your ex mod.

More on Claims

More on Risk management 

A claim reserve represents the amount of money that a carrier expects to pay in the future for a given claim. Reserves can include allocations for adjustment expenses, legal defense fees, medical costs and indemnity payments. Claim reserves generally change over time as the claim develops. Lamb Claims Advocates work with our clients to ensure carriers reserve claims accurately, and we will challenge over-inflated reserves when appropriate.

A waiver of subrogation is when the insurance carrier has agreed to waive its right to subrogate (sue) a third party. An example of this is a tenant that is leasing from a landlord. If a guest of the tenant is injured while at the tenant’s facility, the guest can sue the tenant. However, if a waiver of subrogation is in place, the tenant’s insurance carrier is not able to sue the landlord to reclaim the cost of the suit.