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5 things agents need to know about the transition of Harleysville Mutual business to Nationwide Mutual
Commercial lines Personal lines Flood insurance
5 things agents need to know about the transition of Harleysville Mutual business to Nationwide Mutual With the Harleysville/Nationwide merger completed, Harleysville Mutual Insurance Company has merged with and into Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, and Harleysville Mutual no longer exists. Therefore, all commercial and personal lines policies with effective dates on or after May 1, 2012, that would otherwise have been renewed in Harleysville Mutual will renew in Nationwide Mutual. Any Harleysville Mutual policies (new and renewal) issued with an effective date on or after May 1, 2012, will be converted to a Nationwide Mutual policy by way of a Change of Name Endorsement.Below are "5 things agents need to know" as this transition gets underway. Look for more news on this process in future issues of In the Know, as well as in the Merger Information Center on our agent portal—accessHarleysville®. 1. Harleysville agent portal and P&C policy systems to be unavailable weekend of May 5 and 6 To enable us to make the system changes required to transition Harleysville Mutual Insurance Company business to Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, the accessHarleysville® agent portal, accessHarleysville//PL® and CL policy systems, and H-Net legacy systems will be unavailable from 8 p.m. (ET) Friday, May 4, through 7 a.m. (ET) Monday, May 7. Commercial and personal lines upload also will be unavailable. Our customer contact center and service center will be open on Saturday, May 5, during their regular hours of 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. (ET), and their staffs will be able to access policyholder files and respond to agent and customer calls. Also, agent inquiry may be done from your management system for existing policies, claims and billing. Our claims system will continue to be available throughout the weekend and, as always, you and your Harleysville policyholders can report a claim 24/7 at 800.892.8877, or by submitting it online from our corporate website. The suspension does not affect Harleysville life or flood business, and all systems will be fully functional at the start of business on Monday, May 7.
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appreciate your support as we take another step toward the integration of
2. Agencies that download with Harleysville must update carrier lists with Nationwide Mutual company name and NAIC code If your agency downloads policy data from Harleysville's P&C systems, you must add the following as the parent company (with the additional Harleysville companies identified as writing companies) to the list of carriers in your agency management system immediately, and note that there is no change to Harleysville's IVANS mailbox account information: Company Name: Nationwide Mutual—Harleysville NAIC Code for Download: 23787H Note the "H" suffix is added to the NAIC code for download purposes only. Nationwide Mutual's NAIC code is 23787. Once you've completed this one-time addition, your agency will be able to download transactions for Harleysville Mutual Insurance Company policies renewing in Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, and for all new business written in Nationwide Mutual going forward. For policies written in Harleysville's other underwriting companies, there are no changes with regard to download. Please direct any questions regarding P&C policy download to Harleysville's Agency Automation Help Line at 888.547.8547 (option 3). 3.
Maryland MVA requires agents to add Nationwide Mutual to enable
submission Harleysville agents in Maryland need to notify their state's Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA) to include Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company as one of the companies for whom they can submit Maryland Insurance Certifications (FR-19s) electronically. This should be done immediately to minimize the risk of inconveniencing insureds, and establishing the access is easy. Simply have an agency staff member send an email to the MVA at acis@mdot.state.md.us and:
Also, keep in mind that we recently created a dedicated email address for Harleysville commercial lines agents to send all DMV-related problems or issues. Upon emailing your concern to dmv@harleysvillegroup.com, our commercial lines processing team will ensure that it's addressed in a timely manner. 4. Communicating the transition of Harleysville Mutual to Nationwide Mutual to policyholders One of few changes P&C and flood policyholders of Harleysville Mutual Insurance Company will notice with the merger is that the name of their underwriting company has changed to Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, assuming that their policies would otherwise have been renewed with Harleysville Mutual. Within the next week or so, three letters from Harleysville President and COO Michael Browne—all very similar—will notify Harleysville Mutual commercial lines, personal lines and flood policyholders of the change in underwriting companies and welcome them to Nationwide. In addition, the owners of new business and renewal policies written in Harleysville Mutual with effective dates on or after the merger closing date of May 1 will receive a Change of Name Endorsement to satisfy legal requirements. Click on the links below to view the letters and the two versions of the endorsement, and contact your Harleysville commercial lines, personal lines or flood representative with any questions.
5. Amendment to Agency/Company Agreement and applicable incentive plan(s) being issued for P&C agents; new Agreement to be mailed to flood-only agents The change from Harleysville Mutual Insurance Company to Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company creates the need for an Amendment to the Agency/Company Agreement and applicable incentive plan(s) between Harleysville and our P&C agencies. Among other things, this Amendment replaces Harleysville Mutual with Nationwide Mutual as a party to the Agreement and to other amendments, addenda and plan(s), as applicable, and stipulates that our agents' authority under the Agreement is solely with respect to Harleysville-branded business or business assumed by Nationwide Mutual under the merger. The Amendment further specifies that premium stemming from products not branded as Harleysville Insurance products will not be considered under the Harleysville Agency Partnership Incentive Plan or other Harleysville incentive plan(s) that may apply to you. This week, a letter from Brian Flemming, Harleysville's vice president of marketing and agency relations, is being sent electronically to all P&C agency principals to alert them to the need for the Amendment, and to ask that they sign the document electronically via Adobe EchoSign. Agents who write only flood business with Harleysville will receive a new Agency/Company Agreement via U.S. Mail in the near future. Note that all P&C and flood agents currently appointed with Harleysville Mutual automatically will be appointed with Nationwide Mutual; no action is required on the part of your agency or producers, and you will incur no cost for the appointment.Commercial lines A human services 'Hit List' of accounts written in 2Q An addiction treatment center, a Meals on Wheels provider, a rescue mission and a YMCA. These are some of the organizations you'll find on the second quarter 2012 "Hit List" of Harleysville human services accounts that rely on our OthersFirst® Protection Package to meet their very specialized insurance needs. See the list for an idea of our underwriting appetite, and keep in mind that, for the second straight year, Harleysville will pay an extra 5 points commission on new human services business with effective dates between mid-June and the end of July. See our March 20, 2012, agent e-bulletin for more details. To access our host of human services marketing materials, click here. You may obtain a supply of any item listed via our SMARTworks® online ordering system. For help with SMARTworks, refer to the SMARTworks quick reference guide, or contact Charles Cooper in the home office at 800.523.6344, ext. 5615. For sales assistance, contact your Harleysville representative or any member of our home office human services underwriting staff listed on page 2 of our OthersFirst highlights sheet. Personal lines Dwelling fire download now available for business written in accessHarleysville//PL® As of April 2, 2012, agents in the states listed below* where we've launched our new ISO 2002 dwelling fire policy via the "new" accessHarleysville//PL® system can download dwelling fire transactions to their agency management systems. What's more, those same accessHarleysville//PL users are able to download reinstatement and cancellation transactions, a feature many agents have been requesting. * DE,GA,IL,IN,MD,MI,MN,NC,NJ,NY,PA,RI,SC and WI Agents in states where we offer the ISO 1989 dwelling fire product via our legacy system (H-Net) have been downloading dwelling fire for many years. While they currently are not able to download reinstatements and cancellations from H-Net, they will be able to do so from the "new" system once we launch the ISO 2002 product in their states. When such a launch occurs in a particular state, its agents will automatically start receiving dwelling fire download from accessHarleysville//PL—including reinstatements and cancellations—with no additional setup required. If your agency currently does not receive download of your dwelling fire business with us and you would like to begin doing so:
Flood insurance Agents and customers have new number to call when reporting flood losses With the Harleysville/Nationwide merger completed, one change that's effective immediately is the centralization of all flood claims handling within Nationwide. Accordingly, we encourage all Harleysville agents and flood insureds to report flood losses via the Nationwide claims reporting number (800.421.3535) going forward. Note that this number should be used for all Harleysville flood policies, including those written in Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company as well as any of our Harleysville underwriting companies. Once contacted, Nationwide's claim call center will initiate the claim within the flood system. By centralizing the handling of our flood claims, we can create a single database of customer information. At the same time, we will be better positioned to expedite your customers' claims and to maintain better quality control in loss settlement. For more information, see our agent flood FAQs document, as well as Harleysville President and COO Michael Browne's letter to flood policyholders announcing the merger and advising them to call the Nationwide claims number to report losses. If you have questions, contact your Harleysville flood representative.
Know someone who unsubscribed from our Constant Contact emails and would like to start receiving them again? First, make sure they're registered on our agent portal under the correct email address. If that's the case, simply forward this issue of In the Know to your colleagues and direct them to click on the link below and follow the instructions. Re-subscribe to Harleysville's Constant Contact email address list
Questions or comments about this issue? Have a question or comment about something you've just read in In the Know? Click on the reply button now, and tell us what's on your mind.In the Know is sent to all registered users of Harleysville's agent portal—accessHarleysville®. If others in your agency currently do not receive In the Know and would like to do so, they should see your agency's portal administrator for assistance.
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Merger information page Also, check out the special Merger Information Center on our agent portal.
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Flood agents' page
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