Free New Hampshire Property & Casualty practice questions

Answer: B. A responsible officer within the insurance company itself

Paragraph XVII(a) treats it as an unfair practice for an insurer to fail to keep, inside the company, a procedure for handling and adequately answering complaints from policyholders and certificate holders, and that procedure must be led by a responsible officer. The procedure is internal to the insurer, so it is not run by Insurance Department staff, by an outside attorney, or by a producer who holds the insurer's appointment; none of them is a responsible officer of the company.

Answer: C. As soon as practicable, and within 30 days of the determination

Ins 1002.19(b) requires the insurer to use due diligence in deciding whether the waiver conditions in Ins 1002.19(a) are met and then to pay the collision deductible as soon as practicable, no later than 30 days from that determination. Payment does not wait on a subrogation recovery; the separate 30-day period in Ins 1002.19(c) governs returning the insured's portion of a final subrogation recovery, which is a different obligation. The 5 working day and 10 working day periods come from other claim settlement rules and are not the deadline this rule sets for the deductible.

Answer: A. Casualty

The casualty line of authority is defined as coverage against legal liability, including liability for death, injury, or disability or for damage to real or personal property. A contractor's exposure for injuring a homeowner or damaging the house is exactly that kind of legal liability. The property line is defined by loss or damage to property, not by legal liability. The accident and health or sickness definition speaks of coverage for sickness, bodily injury, or accidental death and says nothing about legal liability. The personal lines property and casualty line is limited to coverage sold to individuals and families for primarily noncommercial purposes, and coverage for a contractor's jobs is commercial.

Answer: D. Revocation of the license plus a penalty of up to $2,500 for each of the two acts

RSA 417:10(I) lets the commissioner, once a violation of RSA 417:3 is found after hearing or at the end of a show cause period, suspend, revoke, or refuse to renew the person's license, and, at the commissioner's discretion, impose an administrative penalty of not more than $2,500 for each act or practice found to violate RSA 417:3, either in addition to or in lieu of the license action. Revocation plus a separate penalty for each of the two acts is therefore available. The penalty is measured per act rather than as one total, and it may accompany license action rather than only replace it, so the choices limiting it to a single $2,500 or to license action alone misstate the section. No referral is needed, because the section itself has the commissioner collect the penalty and allows an action in the state's name to enforce collection.

Answer: B. Within 24 months

An individual producer whose license lapses may reinstate the same license within 24 months of the renewal due date without having to pass the written examination again. The statute sets 24 months, not 12. The 180-day figure belongs to the temporary license provision, and the 30-day figure belongs to the change of address rule; neither governs reinstatement after a lapse.

Answer: B. Forcing claimants into litigation by offering substantially less than they ultimately recover

Paragraph XV(a)(5) lists, as an unfair claim settlement practice, making offers well below what claimants eventually recover in court, so that they have to sue to collect what the policy owes. That is the pattern in the stem. The other three choices are also on the XV(a) list, but each describes different conduct: delay in affirming or denying coverage after proof of loss, refusing payment at the insured's own request without an independent evaluation, and knowingly misrepresenting policy terms. Nothing in the stem involves delay, a request by the insured, or a misstatement of the policy. Under the opening words of XV(a), the listed acts are unfair claim settlement practices when committed without just cause and not merely inadvertently or accidentally.

Answer: D. It names credit insurance as a line of its own, listed as credit-limited line credit insurance

The statutory list of lines of authority includes a separate entry for credit-limited line credit insurance, so credit insurance is a line of its own rather than a part of another line. It is not placed inside the accident and health or sickness line or the casualty line; each of those has its own entry with its own definition. Because the statute lists it directly, credit insurance does not depend on a Department rule to exist as a line of authority.

Answer: D. A policy covering fire damage to a client's warehouse and to the stock stored inside it

New Hampshire defines the property line of authority as coverage for direct or consequential loss or damage to property of every kind, so fire damage to a building and its contents falls within it. Coverage against legal liability for injury to others is the casualty line. Disability income benefits appear in the definitions of the life line and the accident and health or sickness line, not in the property definition. Annuities are part of the life line.

Answer: C. The Commissioner cannot approve it yet, because a resident applicant must be at least 18 years of age

Before approving a resident producer license application, the Commissioner must find, among other things, that the applicant is at least 18 years of age. Passing the examination is a separate qualification in the same list and does not replace the age requirement, so a 17-year-old cannot yet be approved. The statutory minimum is 18, not 21. No sponsor arrangement appears among the RSA 402-J:6 qualifications for a resident applicant.

Answer: B. Upon hearing, suspension or revocation of its certificate, or a fine up to $2,500 per violation

Under RSA 400-A:15(III), when someone knowingly breaks an insurance statute, rule, regulation, or commissioner's order, and no other penalty is expressly provided, the available sanctions after a hearing are suspension or revocation of a certificate of authority or license, or an administrative fine capped at $2,500 per violation. The stem supplies the knowing violation and rules out any other express penalty, so that is the sanction available. The paragraph requires a hearing, so a fine imposed with no hearing does not fit it. It sets the fine as a per-violation cap of $2,500, not a multiple of premium, and nothing in the paragraph makes the violation a felony or provides for criminal prosecution.