Compliance Corner - June 2025
Adjusters - Prepare for Hurricane Season
Emergency Adjusters
Emergency adjuster licenses and appointments made last hurricane season are not valid for the 2025 hurricane season. Emergency adjuster licenses are typically valid for 180 days from issue and do not renew. If you plan to adjust claims in Florida during the 2025 hurricane season, you are responsible for making sure you are property licensed and appointed prior to adjusting claims. Only insurance companies and adjusting firms can apply for Emergency Adjuster licenses.
All-Lines Adjusters
Company and independent adjusters should make sure their appointment is valid and note whether the appointment is near its renewal date.
Public Adjusting Firms and Adjusters
- Is your adjuster license active?
- Is your public adjuster firm license active? Use our Licensee Search portal to verify the status of your license and appointment.
- You can search for the firm's license using our Licensee Search portal.
- Are you self-appointed or appointed by an adjusting firm?
- Have you filed the required $50,000 surety bond filed with AgentLicensing@MyFloridaCFO.com?
- Are you compliant with your continuing education requirements? You can review your continuing education status through your MyProfile account.
- Has a primary adjuster been designated for your firm?
- Is your contact and other demographic information up to date? You can update it via your online secure MyProfile account.
- Are the apprentices in your firm licensed and appointed?
- Do you have your department-issued license with you?
The Importance of Appointments - Maintaining a Valid License
Florida Statutes s. 626.112(1) makes it clear a license is considered invalid without an active appointment. This means a licensee cannot lawfully transact insurance business. It is the licensee's responsibility to maintain at least one appointment, even though most appointments are made by insurance companies. Licensees should not assume an insurer or employer is maintaining an appointment.
It is critical that all licensees monitor their MyProfile account for messages from the Department, and changes in their profile, including the loss of appointments or expiration of a surety bond. This is the simplest way to ensure you are not conducting business in violation of the Florida Insurance Code.
Common Reasons for Lack of an Appointment
Continuing Education Non-Compliance - when a licensee becomes CE non-compliant, all appointments are automatically terminated.
Failure to Maintain a Surety Bond - appointments are cancelled immediately if a licensee whose license type requires a surety bond fails to maintain an active surety bond and the Department receives notification.
Expiration of an Appointment - insurer appointments automatically expire two years after the original effective date.
Suspension of License - all licenses and appointments are cancelled when a licensee is suspended by the Department. Once the suspension period ends, the licensee is required to submit a new application for a license to the Department for consideration.
Termination of Appointment by Insurers - insurers may terminate a license for a number of reasons, including termination for cause.
Expiration of Work Authorization Status
Lost Designated Supervisor - this situation applies only to 4-40 customer representatives who are required to maintain a supervising 2-20 agent for their license to be valid.
License Types That Allow Self-Appointment
Several license types may "self-appoint", in other words, the name of the appointment is the agent's licensed name. The license types that allow self-appointment include:
Public Adjusters
All-lines Adjusters
Unaffiliated insurance agent
The Department receives complaints from insurers and others reporting licensees transacting insurance without a valid appointment, which is a violation of the Florida Insurance Code. The Bureau of Investigation will look into the allegation and take the necessary enforcement action.
Title Agencies: Title Data Filing for Calendar Year 2025
The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation (Office) is conducting its annual Title Agencies Data Filing pursuant to sections 624.307 and 627.782, F.S. and Rule 69O-186.013, F.A.C. Title Insurance Agencies licensed at any time during Calendar Year 2024 are required filers. There are no exceptions - even if your agency closed during 2024. Your submission was due to the Office no later than 11:59 PM ET on Saturday, May 31, 2025. We recommend any title agency that has not already completed its Data Filing to do so immediately to avoid possible enforcement action against the agency's license.
If you have questions regarding this filing process, please email the Office at TitleAgencyReporting@floir.com or contact the Market Data Collections Unit at (850) 413-3147. If phone lines are busy you are encouraged to send your questions by email. Your email may request that a representative from Market Data Collections call you (remember to provide your number). Calls will be returned in the order your email messages are received.
MyProfile Accounts — Special Requirements for Creating or Changing Usernames and Passwords
The Bureau of Licensing has enhanced the requirements for creating or changing usernames and passwords. This action has been taken to protect our licensees' accounts from fraudulent access.
The new requirements are:
- The username must be 8-14 characters long.
- The password must be 8-14 characters long and must contain the following:
at least one upper case letter
at least one lower case letter
at least one number
can have any one of the following characters: ! @ $ ?
May not be user’s first or last name (in any combination)
May not be the following words or phrases: Password or P@ssw0rd (in any case combination)
Passwords will expire after 90 days and must be changed. Each time an address, username, or password is changed, an email notification will be sent to the email address on file with the subject: DFS DICE MyProfile Data Change (example below)
Dear Account Holder,
The purpose of this email is to notify you that there have been changes to your DFS DICE MyProfile account.
The following information has been changed on 05/05/2025 at 13:58:23.
- Login Information.
This email is coming from an unmonitored account. Please do not reply. If you did not authorize the changes listed above or have questions regarding the changes, please contact the DFS Insurance Agent and Agency Services helpdesk at AgentLicensing@myfloridacfo.com.
If you have not made a change, please access your account to determine whether unauthorized changes have been made. If unauthorized access is made and you no longer have access to your MyProfile account, report the activity to AgentLicensing@myfloridacfo.com. Florida Statutes s. 626.551 requires all licensees to update any demographic changes through their MyProfile account.
Verify Before You Sell! Stay Informed - Stay Legal
Don't do it. Do not allow yourself to be recruited by a marketer touting cheaper health insurance or a guaranteed "can't lose" investment for your clients.
Many times, the sales materials will be impressive, and fabricated letters from regulators or others will give the appearance of legitimacy. Some of the warning signs of an unauthorized or bogus health plan will be the use of trade associations, unions, or affinity groups that a consumer must join to be eligible for coverage. Another warning sign is the use of the phrase "Multiple Employer Welfare Arrangement" (MEWA). While MEWAs can be legitimate, they must be licensed by the state, and not many are. The marketers may claim their plan is a federal plan or an Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) plan and exempt from state regulation, which is a definite red flag.
There is always someone who has a guaranteed, get-rich-quick investment seeking out insurance professionals with an established market of clients to whom they can sell these products. These bogus investments can range from communications equipment companies to real estate and land development opportunities, which almost always turn out to be unregistered securities. These investments have been so well packaged and pitched that some agents also purchased them, as did their family members.
Too often unsuspecting agents have allowed themselves and their clients to become victims by purchasing a less expensive health plan that never paid any claims, or an investment promising high returns that turned out to be a sham. The last time there was a peak in this type of activity, numerous consumers were financially devastated as they were left holding unpaid medical bills or worthless investments. As a result, agents lost their insurance licenses and were also subjected to criminal penalties and civil lawsuits.
As an insurance professional you are responsible for conducting the necessary due diligence to avoid putting your clients at risk. The excuses, "I thought it was legitimate" and "I was fooled and am also a victim," are not acceptable defenses. When verifying an insurance company’s license or determining if an investment is registered, make sure that you have the correct and complete name as some scams will use names similar to licensed companies and registered investments to create confusion. Don't do it; do not allow yourself to become another victim. Verify before you sell!
The Division of Insurance Agent & Agency Services recommends the following procedures agents may use when researching whether an insurance company is properly licensed to transact insurance in Florida. By offering these guidelines, we hope to provide a valuable service to all agents and another useful tool for protecting the public.
Agents will find that, in most cases, the simple procedures outlined below will easily identify those insurance companies presently authorized to conduct insurance business in Florida. An agent may use a print-screen function to capture a printout of the company as listed on the web site and keep in their file to show they found the authorized insurance company.
Make sure you have the complete and correct name of the insurance company. Many insurance company names are very similar. Go to https://companysearch.myfloridacfo.gov.
Enter the insurance company's name and click on the "Search" button.
Confirm that the insurance company as identified in step 1 is listed and authorized to conduct the line of business contemplated. Depending on the line of business, the following Authorization Types confer authority:
- Certificate of Authority
- Letter of Approval
- Letter of Eligibility
- Letter of Registration
- License
- Provisional Certificate of Authority
- Residual Market
Insurance companies shown with an Authorization Status as “Active” and Authorization Type as “Permit” have only begun the authorization process and are NOT authorized to conduct insurance business.
If the insurance company is not listed on the web site or the insurance company is shown with an Authorization Type not listed above, the agent should not place insurance business with that company. Also, just because an insurance company is authorized today does not mean it will necessarily remain authorized in the future. Always check.
This web site lists authorized insurers involved in insurance business in Florida. If they are not listed on the website, agents should assume they are not authorized.
IMPORTANT: Agents who, directly or indirectly, aid or represent an unauthorized insurance company can be held accountable for unpaid claims, lose their agent licenses or face other disciplinary sanctions. Please see section 626.901, Florida Statutes, to read the laws. To alert us of possible unauthorized insurance or unregistered securities being sold please notify us at AskDFS@MyFloridaCFO.com.
The Office of Financial Regulation (OFR) oversees securities regulation. To check licensing/registration status you can call the OFR at (850) 487-9687 or use their online search tool.
View the list of unauthorized entities that have had action taken against them in the state of Florida.
Always go to https://companysearch.myfloridacfo.gov to search for insurance companies authorized to do business in Florida.