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Featuring authors from across our organization on various topics related to risk management and employee benefits, our blog is a great resource to help you stay informed.

Our Scott thought leaders provide content on a regular basis to elevate your thinking surrounding critical components of your company’s culture and overall performance.

Healthcare Reform
May 4, 2017
Employee Benefits

American Health Care Act passes the House, faces uphill battle in Senate

After months of hand wringing and arm twisting, the GOP goal of repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act (ACA) passed its first legislative test today in the House of Representatives.  The American Health Care Act (AHCA) was narrowly approved by the House today in a vote of 217-213.  The bill received no democratic support.
 
This vote comes 41 days after the bill was pulled from the floor on March 24 when the GOP realized they didn’t have enough votes for the bill to pass.  Since then there have been two amendments to the AHCA that flipped enough votes to result in passage today.  

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Employee Benefits

The Healthcare Landscape – Part Two Paradigm Shift: Understanding the Competitive Advantage of Health

The video below is the second installment in our series sharing highlights from the Business North Carolina 2017 Healthcare Round Table event that we hosted in our Greensboro office last month.  The full discussion is featured in the May issue of Business North Carolina Magazine.

In this video, Sean Willoughby-Ray, Benefits Practice Lead/Vice President, discusses how health is a competitive advantage –  for individuals and businesses.  

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Cyber Risk Prevention
April 27, 2017
Property & Casualty

Protect Your Business from Cyber Extortion

When a technology company was hit by a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack by a hacker who had gained control of one of its critical control panels, it was asked to be paid in exchange for returning control to its operations. The company chose not to comply with the extortionists and instead worked to recover its account by changing passwords. Unfortunately, the hackers had created backup logins to the panel and started randomly deleting files once they saw the company’s actions. This example of cyber extortion, unfortunately, put the company out of business.

Extortion as a result of a cyber attack is becoming more and more common for all business types and sizes. One reason for the increase in incidents is that end-user software like Cryptolocker has commoditized the malware industry, making it accessible to a wider variety of criminals and less-skilled hackers.

Cyber criminals, for the purposes of extortion, can threaten to shut down computer systems or erase data, infect a company with a virus, publish private information or personally identifiable information on customers or employees, institute a denial-of-service attack or take over social media accounts. 

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April 13, 2017
Surety Bonds

NMLS Electronic Surety Bonds Adopted By More State Regulatory Agencies

Since Electronic Surety Bonds (ESBs) were launched by the National Multistate Licensing System and Registry (NMLS) in September 2016, many professionals in the mortgage and financial services industries are now required to use ESBs.   Thankfully, this process is much more convenient and efficient than traditional paper surety bonds.

With the addition of the Oregon Division of Financial Regulation later this week (April 15, 2017), 22 state agencies across the country will have adopted ESBs. To view the complete list of states that have adopted the ESB process, view the ESB Adoption Map and Table, which also includes a detailed listing of which types of licenses are required to utilize ESBs in each state. Examples of licenses now utilizing the NMLS Electronic Surety Bonds process include:

•  Mortgage Brokers/Lenders/Servicers
•  Money Transmitters
•  Debt Management/Collection Agencies
•  Check Cashiers
•  Consumer Finance Lenders

In addition to new applicants, existing licensees must convert their paper bonds to ESBs by the conversion deadline listed for each state.

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