Recently, we’ve been getting a lot of questions and confusion over the insurance phrase “mandatory recommendations”. We thought it might help to write a blog post to address what exactly mandatory recommendations from your insurance company entail, and how you as the insured should handle them.
Insurance is a mutually beneficial relationship. In other words, it’s supposed to work for you and your insurance provider.
When you purchase an insurance policy, your insurance provider offers you financial security in return for your purchase. Your insurance company vows to pay out for claims (up to the provided limits) should they be covered under your policy. This payout is meant to restore your life back to normal and to help you overcome financial strife due to a loss.
This relationship works because while your insurance company has offered to take the financial risk off your hands, they also value their product based on that very risk. You pay a premium that is calculated by a variety of factors. These include how valuable your property is to replace, how high your limits are, and how risky you are to insure.
When a property owner has a structure that contains glaring risk issues (i.e. fire hazards or a rotting roof), their insurance company gets a little nervous. The insured is more likely to experience a loss. That’s where mandatory recommendations may come in.
As a stipulation for coverage, your insurance company may request that you make some adjustments to your property in order to limit your risk – such as installing handrails to a porch or repairing dilapidated steps.
Often, these requests are referred to as “mandatory recommendations”; the key word being “mandatory”, not “recommendations”.
You must adhere to these requests or your insurance company can non-renew your policy and refuse to provide you with insurance coverage. If you receive mandatory recommendations (or recs) from your insurance provider, please do not take them lightly.
Contact your independent insurance agency if you have questions about these recommendations or any other insurance-related matters.