#insurance
Track insurance costs, premiums, and coverage details
Missouri's HB 974, signed July 2, 2025 and effective January 1, 2026, applies the NAIC Insurance Data Security Model Law to nearly every insurance licensee in the state — requiring a written security program, annual risk assessments, an incident response plan, vendor oversight, and breach notification to regulators within four business days.
The NFIP's authority to issue and renew flood insurance expires September 30, 2026 unless Congress reauthorizes it. During a lapse, existing policies stay in force and claims are still paid, but no new or renewal policies can be written — a risk for small businesses closing on property, refinancing, or renewing coverage in flood zones. Here's what happens in a lapse and how to prepare.
Private-label pet food carries costs no co-packer invoice shows — kibble MOQs of 20,000–40,000 lbs, per-state AAFCO registration fees from $30 to $3,500 a year, and recall exposure running 3–5× direct costs. How to structure a chart of accounts, amortize per-SKU formulation fees, and fund a recall reserve before your first production run.
California's admitted commercial property market has contracted sharply — surplus lines grew from 6% to 20% of the market since 2014, the FAIR Plan raised its commercial limits to $20M per building, and a 29.1% average FAIR Plan rate increase takes effect October 2026. Here's how small business owners can navigate renewals, DIC wrap requirements, and the new SB 547 non-renewal moratorium.
MGA profit commissions aren't calculated until 18–24 months after a policy year ends and don't finalize until the third anniversary. This guide covers accruing constrained estimates under ASC 606, keeping fiduciary premium trust accounts separate from operating funds, and a chart-of-accounts structure that keeps multi-year true-ups auditable.
Cover Genius's $100M raise at a $1.9B valuation signals how fast embedded insurance is reaching small merchants. Most Shopify-style protection apps make you an agent under ASC 606, so only the 10–30% commission is your revenue — here's how to verify licensing and book the fees correctly.
Workers' comp dividend checks and retro-rating adjustments arrive 6–30 months after a policy expires. Dividends are discretionary — book them as a reduction of insurance expense when declared, never accrued in advance. Retro adjustments are contractual — accrue the estimated premium as a liability in the period the losses occurred, then true up at each 6-, 18-, and 30-month adjustment.
A Business Owner's Policy bundles general liability, commercial property, and business income coverage at 10–15% less than buying them separately — median premiums run $57–$83/month. Here's who a BOP fits, the exclusions that catch owners off guard, and why clean books determine how much a business income claim actually pays.
Standard business interruption insurance requires physical damage to your property, so a cloud outage like the October 2025 AWS or Azure incidents typically pays nothing. This guide explains how contingent business interruption (CBI) coverage works, the trigger language and 24–72-hour waiting periods to check, typical costs ($40–$130/month standalone), and the financial records you need to substantiate a claim.
As of January 1, 2026, CMS-0057-F requires Medicare Advantage, Medicaid, CHIP, and ACA marketplace payers to decide prior authorization requests within 72 hours (expedited) or 7 calendar days (standard) and to give specific denial reasons — with FHIR-based prior auth APIs mandated by January 1, 2027. Here's what small medical and dental practices should do now.
In H1 2026, large commercial accounts saw premiums fall an average of 2.7% while small business accounts rose about 1.1%, driven by minimum-premium floors, catastrophe exposure, and hardening casualty rates offsetting property-side relief.
A drone light show fleet is a depreciable capital asset, not a consumable, so operators need per-unit asset registers, Section 179 or MACRS five-year schedules, a budgeted attrition reserve, and job-costed FAA waiver and insurance fees to price a show correctly against fireworks.
