ICBC expected to lose $890M this year

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by misher

I provided quotes....and why would they time this so that the legal case won't be resolved before the election instead of implementing it this year?

They are giving everybody plenty of notice to adjust. You don't do these things overnight.

There will be no legal case (with any chance of winning).

[misher]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

They are giving everybody plenty of notice to adjust. You don't do these things overnight.

There will be no legal case (with any chance of winning).

They did the last one pretty fast.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by misher

They did the last one pretty fast.

Bet the trial lawyers were wishing they accepted the first solution.

[stump]

Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal

Insurance is going up everywhere in Canada. Global warming is one of the causes. Cars and houses are also more expensive nowadays. There are more natural disaster and they are costlier.

That doesn't make any sense. Why would global warming cause the insurance of my car to go up 10% a year. It's the same car losing value year after year and my lifestyle is exactly the same. The insurance is covering my car which is worth less than the year before.

[DKaz]

Dumb road designers, it's not like mountains exist or anything.

[NotToScale]

Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal

Insurance is going up everywhere in Canada. Global warming is one of the causes. Cars and houses are also more expensive nowadays. There are more natural disaster and they are costlier.

oh global warming... that's the culprit

[officedweller]

Originally Posted by DKaz

Dumb road designers, it's not like mountains exist or anything.

It's also likely that the absence of freeways in cities exposes more cars to accident-prone intersections and T-bone sitautions.

[logicbomb]

Thank god they are doing this. The bodily injury payouts for "pain and suffering" were getting ridiculous.

It was a novel concept way back when but society has degraded to a point where the majority of claims are borderline fraudulent. People are always trying to take shortcuts and were using the auto-lotto to pay for their investments. Now you make them commit to rehabilitation and offer incremental payouts which will deter these fraudsters from scamming the system to get a quick buck.

2 cases recently:

My sister in law really got screwed recently. She accidently opened the door and hit the parked car next to them with a passenger in the passenger seat and no one in the driver seat. No damage on her car but a $350 dent to the other car. Her adjuster mentioned that the other person claimed they were driving out of the stall...weird right? However the adjuster mentioned that she was at fault either way since she was opening the door. Months later, she wanted to repay the claim, and inquired...but unfortunately there was a $2000 injury payout on her policy.

Co-worker witnessed a collision on 75th Ave and 128th St in Surrey. He got out and offered to be a witness as one guy was clearly in the wrong for rear-ending the other. He noticed there wasn't any damage and it got weird when both drivers told my co-worker to "get lost." Co-worker still reported into ICBC suspecting something was up, and he was later asked to provide a signed written description of what he saw (fraud!)

[rpvan]

Originally Posted by misher

Yeah whats up with Manning Park, its like a big loop around the straight route you want to take. Imagine if we could just go straight from Hope to Princeton. How drunk was the guy that designed this.

[]

Someone did not use a ruler when designing our highway system.

[]

Would have been a lot more expensive to cut through mountains in order to make our highways into straight lines. The roads in BC don't follow straight lines due to the terrain and financial constraints. If they had... taxpayers would be paying a massive bill for decades.

[whatnext]

David Eby outflanks the BC Liberals.

New bill to forbid government from taking ICBC profits
Attorney General David Eby said Monday that the bill, to be tabled in the house, will forbid the province from taking "excess optional capital" from ICBC and free the corporation to reinvest that money into lowering rates in future years.

ROB SHAW Updated: March 2, 2020

VICTORIA — New legislation this week will ban the provincial government from siphoning revenue out of the Insurance Corporation of B.C.

Attorney General David Eby said Monday that the bill will forbid the province from taking “excess optional capital” from ICBC and free the corporation to reinvest that money into lowering rates in future years.

“If those surpluses begin to accumulate, if this is something that ICBC experiences, this will continue the public pressure on ICBC and restrict future government’s ability to transfer that money anywhere else except to reduce rates or increase benefits,” said Eby...

https://vancouversun.com/news/politics/new-bill-to-forbid-government-from-taking-icbc-profits

[misher]

Originally Posted by rpvan

Would have been a lot more expensive to cut through mountains in order to make our highways into straight lines. The roads in BC don't follow straight lines due to the terrain and financial constraints. If they had... taxpayers would be paying a massive bill for decades.

I logically understand this though I wonder how much the environmental and economic costs have been due to it. Also I really wonder whats the point of having "modern" technology if we can't make a road straight.

Originally Posted by whatnext

David Eby outflanks the BC Liberals.

New bill to forbid government from taking ICBC profits
Attorney General David Eby said Monday that the bill, to be tabled in the house, will forbid the province from taking "excess optional capital" from ICBC and free the corporation to reinvest that money into lowering rates in future years.

ROB SHAW Updated: March 2, 2020

VICTORIA — New legislation this week will ban the provincial government from siphoning revenue out of the Insurance Corporation of B.C.

Attorney General David Eby said Monday that the bill will forbid the province from taking “excess optional capital” from ICBC and free the corporation to reinvest that money into lowering rates in future years.

“If those surpluses begin to accumulate, if this is something that ICBC experiences, this will continue the public pressure on ICBC and restrict future government’s ability to transfer that money anywhere else except to reduce rates or increase benefits,” said Eby...

https://vancouversun.com/news/politics/new-bill-to-forbid-government-from-taking-icbc-profits

Its standard to use surpluses form crown corporations to cover government debts. The NDP is now using our "revenue-neutral" carbon tax and making it a for-profit tax. Crown corporations should not be investing surpluses into stocks/the market while taxes are raised to cover debts elsewhere.

The NDP has been looting ICBC in small amounts for decades since the social credit party days despite promising at the start that it would be "revenue-neutral". Also ICBC often made losses under the NDP which they hid before elections (in this case making a 22% increase after the election).

HON. L. HANSON: There haven't been great payments to government out of ICBC.

MR. SIHOTA: What I should have asked the minister is: will he give us an assurance that there will be no rate increase between 1989 and 1990, because that's when we're going to have the next election? We tracked four elections in the material, and it seems there's a repetitious trend here. The minister may say I'm making unfair allegations, but I must say to the minister that it's more than coincidence.

To look at it with a bit more depth, I want to deal with what the minister says. He says it's based on sound actuarial policies and user-pay. As the rate of claims goes up, so does the rate that individuals pay. I have the financial statement for the corporation here, and I wonder if the minister could explain what happened between 1985 and 1986. In 1986, which happened to be an election year, the corporation chose not to raise its rates. In fact, the average premium fell from $371 to $362, despite the fact that the number of accidents went up and despite the fact, if the minister cares to look.... The financial statement shows that in 1986 the corporation had an underwriting loss of $170 million and that it applied its surplus from previous years to keep those rates down. It's right here in the financial statement. It shows a profit in 1986 of $1 million compared to a profit in 1985 of $73 million.

It seems to me that 1985 was therefore an incredibly good year for the corporation in that it had built up a relatively high profit to cushion what would happen in 1986. If you look at the underwriting loss, which doubled from $84 million to $170 million, it's obvious that there was an increase in claims, but the government — or someone — chose to cushion it. So I think it lends credence to its being more than just coincidence. But the point has been made, and the minister has heard it. Like I say, we will see what happens in the next election. It's obvious what's happening. This year people are being gouged by 22 percent to build up a surplus in subsequent years.

https://www.leg.bc.ca/documents-data/debate-transcripts/34th-parliament/2nd-session/34p_02s_880422a

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by misher

Its standard to use surpluses form crown corporations to cover government debts. The NDP is now using our "revenue-neutral" carbon tax and making it a for-profit tax. Crown corporations should not be investing surpluses into stocks/the market while taxes are raised to cover debts elsewhere.

The mental gymnastics you engage in when it's not "your guy" doing something are quite remarkable.

If ICBC is profitable, they should be reducing insurance rates, and/or investing in safer driving initiatives, etc. as is their mandate.

Now they need to do BC Hydro.

[Migrant_Coconut]

Originally Posted by misher

I logically understand this though I wonder how much the environmental and economic costs have been due to it. Also I really wonder whats the point of having "modern" technology if we can't make a road straight.

The past and present SkyTrain costs overruns - or ten minutes with Railroad Tycoon & Transport Fever - will tell you why that's a bad idea.

[SFUVancouver]

I just renewed my insurance and it went down about 10%. Happy to see the new formula didn't pinch my pocketbook.

[misher]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

The mental gymnastics you engage in when it's not "your guy" doing something are quite remarkable.

If ICBC is profitable, they should be reducing insurance rates, and/or investing in safer driving initiatives, etc. as is their mandate.

Now they need to do BC Hydro.

Agreed as the NDP has traditionally taken money from BC Hydro. Though admittedly they seem to have rarely taken money from crown corps....but also admittedly their crown corps tend to be running deficits so there wasn't opportunity to. If we're going to apply this to ICBC we should do it for all crown corporations to be equal. Also would be good to ban debt deferrals.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by misher

Agreed as the NDP has traditionally taken money from BC Hydro. Though admittedly they seem to have rarely taken money from crown corps....but also admittedly their crown corps tend to be running deficits so there wasn't opportunity to. If we're going to apply this to ICBC we should do it for all crown corporations to be equal. Also would be good to ban debt deferrals.

I would argue that ICBC is different due to the fact it is an insurance company and is therefore much more dependent on having a warchest of reserves in order to function.

[misher]

Originally Posted by chowhou

I would argue that ICBC is different due to the fact it is an insurance company and is therefore much more dependent on having a warchest of reserves in order to function.

For any crown corporation your warchest is the government.

Look at it this way, we would have ended up paying more overall if we took out loans back then then we likely would have gained investing the surplus.

I totally agree though that ICBC has been making a deficit for years and needed fixing. No idea if the proposed NDP changes are the fix that’s needed and if they will pass once this goes to court. Good to see an attempt though. Will criticize them if that attempt fails and praise them if it succeeds.

[chowhou]

Originally Posted by misher

For any crown corporation your warchest is the government.

And I think that's fine if the government works that way, but that's not how our governments have worked. No government has looked at ICBC with good intentions and said "Hey, we'll hold onto that money for you and keep it safe -- don't worry, we'll never spend it on anything else".

[misher]

Originally Posted by chowhou

And I think that's fine if the government works that way, but that's not how our governments have worked. No government has looked at ICBC with good intentions and said "Hey, we'll hold onto that money for you and keep it safe -- don't worry, we'll never spend it on anything else".

Welcome to why we privatize most businesses. Because the public system sucks with little accountability.

And on another note, ICBC was just hit with a massive proposed lawsuit that covers both the NDP and Liberals. Unfortunately just like Trump when he said he will get Meng released as part of the trade deal, Eby is saying a bunch of things that are now going to bite us in the ass because they are being used in legal cases as statements of fact.

'Thanks for ripping me off': B.C. government, ICBC hit with $900M proposed class action lawsuit

The proposed class action claims the newly revealed medical drain on the Insurance Corporation also "raided ICBC's budget"— taking medical fees from the insurance corporation, which passed the cost to drivers and injury victims.

It alleges the "unlawful scheme" has been used by every provincial government since the creation of the public insurer in 1973 — including Eby's NDP.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/icbc-proposed-class-action-lawsuit-1.5483879

[whatnext]

This is welcome news:

ICBC filing for 15% decrease on basic car insurance rates to prepare to switch to no-fault
By Richard Zussman Global News
Posted December 14, 2020

The Insurance Corporation of British Columbia is set to file for the largest reduction in basic insurance rates in the province’s history.

ICBC is asking the B.C. Utilities Commission to approve a 15-per-cent rate decrease as the province transitions to a no-fault insurance model on May 1, 2021.

The B.C. government has promised a 20-per-cent decrease in overall car insurance rates....

https://globalnews.ca/news/7521697/icbc-decrease-basic-car-insurance-no-fault/