Senate Bill No. 358
(By Senators Minard, Jenkins, Minear and Sharpe)
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[Introduced January 24, 2003; referred to the Committee on
Banking and Insurance; and then to the Committee on Finance.]
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A BILL to amend article five, chapter thirty-three of the code of
West Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as
amended, by adding thereto a new section, designated section
twenty-seven, relating to the redomestication of domestic
insurance companies.
Be it enacted by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That article five, chapter thirty-three of the code of West
Virginia, one thousand nine hundred thirty-one, as amended, be
amended by adding thereto a new section, designated section
twenty-seven, to read as follows:
ARTICLE 5. ORGANIZATION AND PROCEDURES OF DOMESTIC STOCK AND
MUTUAL INSURERS.
§33-5-27. Redomestication of stock and mutual insurers.
(a) A domestic insurer may, upon the approval of the
commissioner, transfer its domicile to any other state in which it
is admitted to transact the business of insurance and, upon such transfer, shall cease to be a domestic insurer and shall be
admitted to this state if qualified as a foreign insurer. The
commissioner shall approve the proposed transfer unless he or she
determines the transfer is not in the best interest of the
policyholders of this state.
(b) The certificate of authority, agents' appointments and
licenses, rates and other items which the commissioner allows, in
his or her discretion, that are in existence at the time an insurer
licensed to transact the business of insurance in this state
transfers its corporate domicile to this or any other state by
merger, consolidation or any other lawful method shall continue in
full force and effect upon transfer if the insurer remains duly
qualified to transact the business of insurance in this state. All
outstanding policies of a transferring insurer shall remain in full
force and effect and need not be endorsed as to the new name of the
company or its new location unless so ordered by the commissioner.
(c) A transferring insurer shall file new policy forms with
the commissioner on or before the effective date of the transfer,
but may use existing policy forms with appropriate endorsements if
allowed by, and under such conditions as approved by, the
commissioner. However, every transferring insurer shall notify the
commissioner of the details of the proposed transfer and shall file
promptly any resulting amendments to corporate documents filed or
required to be filed with the commissioner.
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(NOTE: The purpose of this bill is to provide a means whereby
any domestic insurer can transfer its domicile to another state and
provide a means for the continuation of a certificate of authority
and other approvals pertaining to a domestic insurer that transfers
its corporate domicile to another state by merger, consolidation,
or any other lawful method. There is no regulatory framework
present in the West Virginia code pertaining to the redomestication
of insurance companies. A redomestication law is necessary in
order to provide the insurance commissioner with notice of
anticipated withdrawal from the market in West Virginia by
insurance companies and which will establish a mechanism for the
orderly entry or withdrawal from our market.
This section is new; therefore, strike-throughs and
underscoring have been omitted.)