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Contingencies | 12 Months Ended
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Dec. 31, 2014
Commitments and Contingencies Disclosure [Abstract] |
Contingencies | NOTE 22. CONTINGENCIES In the ordinary course of its businesses, the Company is involved in legal proceedings, including lawsuits, regulatory examinations and inquiries. Except with regard to the matters discussed below, based on currently available information, the Company does not believe that it is reasonably possible that any of its pending legal proceedings will have a material effect on the Company’s consolidated financial statements. Over the last several years, certain state insurance regulators, legislators, treasurers/controllers, and their respective agents have been involved in an array of initiatives that seek, in various ways, to impose new duties on life insurance companies to proactively search for deaths of their insureds and contact the insureds’ beneficiaries even though such beneficiaries may not have submitted claims, including due proof of death, as required under the terms of state-approved life insurance policy forms. These initiatives together comprise a set of circumstances involving potential changes in the law or changes in the interpretation of existing laws that could have the effect of altering the terms of Kemper’s life insurance subsidiaries’ (the “Life Companies”) existing life insurance contracts by imposing new requirements that did not exist and were not contemplated at the time the Life Companies’ entered into such contracts. Legislation. One type of initiative involves legislation. Legislation has been enacted in Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Maryland, Montana, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Rhode Island and Vermont, with varying effective dates (the “DMF Statutes”), that requires life insurance companies to compare on a regular basis their records for all in-force policies (including those policies issued prior to the effective dates of the legislation) against the database of reported deaths maintained by the Social Security Administration or a comparable database (a “Death Master File”). In contrast, New Mexico and Tennessee have enacted legislation that also requires such comparisons, but exempts life insurance companies, like the Life Companies, that have not previously utilized a Death Master File, and instead only requires that such companies conduct Death Master File comparisons for life insurance policies issued and delivered in each of those states after the legislation’s effective date. Likewise, Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi have enacted statutes that require such comparisons, but only with respect to policies issued on or after their respective effective dates, without regard to prior Death Master File use. With respect to those DMF Statutes that apply retroactively and which would likely have an adverse effect on the Company’s operations and financial position, the Life Companies have filed declaratory judgment actions in applicable state courts challenging the application of such statutes to policies issued prior to the subject DMF Statute’s effective date:
• | In November 2012, certain of the Life Companies filed a declaratory judgment action in Kentucky state court, asking the court to construe the Kentucky DMF Statute to apply only prospectively, i.e., only with respect to those life insurance policies issued in Kentucky on or after the effective date of the Kentucky DMF Statute, consistent with what the Life Companies believe are the requirements of applicable Kentucky statutory law, the Kentucky Constitution and the Contract Clause of the United States Constitution. In April 2013, the trial court denied the subject Life Companies’ motion for summary judgment and held that the requirements of the Kentucky DMF Statute apply to life insurance policies issued before the statute’s January 1, 2013 effective date. The subject Life Companies appealed the trial court’s decision and in August 2014, in a unanimous opinion, the Kentucky Court of Appeals reversed the trial court and held that the Kentucky DMF statute fell within Kentucky’s statutory presumption against retroactive legislation. Therefore, the Court ruled, the Kentucky DMF Statute can only apply to policies issued on and after January 1, 2013. In September 2014, the Kentucky Department of Insurance filed a motion asking for the Kentucky Supreme Court to undertake a discretionary review of the Court of Appeal’s ruling. A decision by the Kentucky Supreme Court on whether to review the Court of Appeals’ decision is expected by the third quarter of 2015.
• | In July 2013, certain of the Life Companies filed a declaratory judgment action in state court in Maryland, asking the court to construe the Maryland DMF Statute to apply only prospectively, i.e., only to policies issued in Maryland after the effective date of the Maryland DMF Statute, consistent with what the Life Companies believe are the requirements of the Maryland Constitution and the Contract Clause of the United States Constitution. The Maryland Insurance Administration filed a motion to dismiss the action, contending that the subject Life Companies were required to
NOTE 22. CONTINGENCIES (Continued) exhaust their administrative remedies before filing their action in the trial court. In March 2014, the trial court granted the Maryland Insurance Administration’s motion. The Life Companies appealed the trial court’s ruling. The Maryland appellate courts have declined to stay enforcement of the Maryland DMF Statute pending the appeal, and the Life Companies are complying with the Maryland DMF Statute while they continue to pursue their appeal. The Life Companies’ appeal was heard by the Maryland Court of Special Appeals in December 2014. The parties are awaiting the court’s decision.
• | In August 2014, certain of the Life Companies filed a declaratory judgment action in Indiana state court, asking the court to construe the Indiana DMF Statute to apply only prospectively, i.e., only with respect to those life insurance policies issued in Indiana on or after the effective date of the Indiana DMF Statute, consistent with what the Life Companies believe are the requirements of applicable Indiana statutory law, the Indiana Constitution and the Contract Clause of the United States Constitution. The Indiana Department of Insurance filed an answer in response to the subject Life Companies’ complaint in October 2014, and the Life Companies filed a motion for summary judgment in January 2015. A hearing on that motion is scheduled for May 2015.
Unclaimed property compliance audits/litigation. A second type of initiative involves an unclaimed property compliance audit of the Life Companies (the “Treasurers’ Audit”) being conducted by a private audit firm retained by the treasurers/controllers of 38 states (the “Audit Firm”) and related litigation. In July 2013, the California State Controller (the “CA Controller”) filed a complaint for injunctive relief against the Life Companies in state court in California, seeking an order requiring the Life Companies to produce all of their in-force policy records to the Audit Firm to enable the firm to perform a comparison of such records against a Death Master File and to ascertain whether any of the insureds under such policies may be deceased. In December 2013, the CA Controller filed a motion for preliminary injunction seeking the same injunctive relief. A hearing on that motion has been continued by the court until the California Court of Appeals rules on a preliminary injunction order issued in a related case involving an unaffiliated life insurance company, entitled Chiang v. American National Insurance Company (the “ANICO Appeal”). In July 2014, the court granted a motion by the CA Controller to stay the Life Companies’ litigation in its entirety, including all discovery, pending a decision in the ANICO Appeal. As described below, the Life Companies have filed a counterclaim in this case against the CA Controller. The current stay of the Controller’s case against the Life Companies means that no substantive ruling is likely to occur before late 2015. Pending the outcome of this litigation, the Life Companies have not produced any of their in-force policy records to the CA Controller. Examinations/enforcement actions by regulators. A third type of initiative involves examinations and other actions by state insurance regulators. The Life Companies are the subject of a multi-state market conduct examination by five state insurance regulators that is focused on the Life Companies’ claim settlement and policy administration practices, and specifically their compliance with state unclaimed property statutes (the “Multi-State Exam”). The Multi-State Exam was originated in June 2012 as a single-state examination by the Illinois Director of Insurance. Insurance regulators from five additional states - California, Florida, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and North Dakota - joined the examination in May 2013. In August 2014, New Hampshire withdrew from participation in the Multi-State Exam. In July 2013, the Life Companies received requests from the Illinois Department of Insurance, as the managing lead state for the Multi-State Exam, for a significant volume of information beyond that which the Life Companies had already produced, including their records of all in-force policies and other information of the type previously requested by the Audit Firm as part of the Treasurers’ Audit and which is the subject of the CA Controller’s complaint. This request prompted the Illinois litigation noted below. In August 2014, the Illinois Department of Insurance appointed a law firm to act as an additional examiner in the Multi-State Exam, which remains ongoing. Pending related litigation. In September 2013, certain of the Life Companies filed declaratory judgment actions against the insurance regulators in the states of California, Florida, Illinois and Pennsylvania, asking the courts in those states to declare that applicable law does not require life insurers to search a Death Master File to ascertain whether insureds are deceased. The subject Life Companies are also asking the courts to declare that regulators in those states do not have the legal authority to (i) obtain life insurers’ policy records for the purpose of comparing those records against a Death Master File, and/or (ii) impose payment obligations on life insurers before a claim and due proof of death have been submitted by policy beneficiaries. The declaratory judgment action in California referenced above was filed as a cross-complaint to the CA Controller’s complaint, joining the California Insurance Commissioner and the Audit Firm as parties to the cross-complaint. The CA Controller has filed a motion to dismiss the Life Companies’ cross-complaint, contending that the Life Companies’ request for a declaratory judgment is premature and not ripe for adjudication. A hearing on that motion has been continued until the Court of Appeals issues its decision in the ANICO Appeal. Oral argument in the ANICO Appeal has been set for February 2015. In related NOTE 22. CONTINGENCIES (Continued) activity, the CA Controller’s petition for coordination of the five unclaimed property lawsuits pending in California to have them all heard by the same court was denied in January 2015. In response to the Illinois declaratory judgment action, the Illinois Department of Insurance and its Director (collectively, the “IDOI”) filed a motion to dismiss, and in July 2014, the court in Illinois denied, in part, such motion. Specifically, the court denied the IDOI’s motion to dismiss the Life Companies’ claim seeking a declaration that the IDOI cannot compel the Life Companies to provide their policy records to the IDOI or persons acting on the IDOI’s behalf so as to permit a comparison against the DMF for purposes of identifying deceased insureds, as well as the Life Companies’ associated claim for injunctive relief. The court dismissed with prejudice the other counts in the complaint. In August 2014, the IDOI filed its answer to the counts of the complaint that the Illinois court allowed to stand, and in October 2014, the Life Companies filed a motion for summary judgment with respect to those remaining counts. The IDOI filed a cross motion for summary judgment in December 2014. Formal briefing and a hearing schedule on the summary judgment motions are expected to be set by the court at a May 2015 status conference. The actions against the insurance regulators in the states of Florida and Pennsylvania have been stayed by agreement of the parties pending the outcome of the Illinois action. Conclusion. The results of the aforementioned legislative actions, Treasurers’ Audit, Multi-State Exam and the related litigation cannot currently be predicted. The Life Companies continue to maintain that states lack the legal authority to establish new requirements that could have the effect of changing the terms of existing life insurance contracts with regard to basic claims handling obligations and processes. If state officials are able to apply such new requirements retroactively to the Life Companies’ existing life insurance policies, it will fundamentally alter the nature and timing of their responsibilities under such policies by effectively eliminating contractual terms that condition claim settlement and payment on the receipt of a claim, including “due proof of death” of an insured. The outcomes of the various state initiatives and related litigation could result in changes in the law that could have the effect of altering the terms of the Life Companies’ existing life insurance contracts by imposing new requirements that have a significant effect on, including acceleration of, the Life Companies’ payment and/or escheatment of policy benefits, and significantly increase their claims handling costs. Any attempt to predict the ultimate outcomes (including any estimate of the resulting effect on claim liabilities and reserves for future policy benefits) of these various efforts to change the law would entail predicting on a state-by-state-basis the ultimate outcomes of numerous uncertainties including, but not limited to: how many states might eventually enact laws or interpret existing laws to require the use of a Death Master File or may exact such usage through regulation, examinations or audits; the matching criteria to be used in comparing records of the Life Companies against a Death Master File; the universe of policies affected; whether and to what extent any such laws would be applied retroactively; and the results of unclaimed property audits, examinations and other actions by state insurance regulators and litigation, including challenges to the constitutionality of laws purporting to have retroactive application. Due to the complexity and multi-jurisdictional nature of this issue, as well as the indeterminate number of potential outcomes and their uncertain effects on the Life Companies’ business, Kemper cannot reasonably estimate the amount of loss that it would recognize if the Life Companies were subjected to requirements of the types described in this Note on a retroactive basis.

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