5 Things that May Surprise You About ShelterPoint

In Honor of Their 50th Anniversary!

Anupam Garg

2022-11-15T05:00:00.0000000 2022-11-15T09:15:33.0530000

Reprinted with permission from Insurance Advocate Magazine, October 2022

Time flies when you are having fun, and that is certainly what has been happening over at ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year!  We talked with ShelterPoint, and they gave us a peek behind the curtain as they shared stories and information about their people, culture, and company over the years – and their 50th-anniversary celebration!

Here are the top 5 things you may not have known about ShelterPoint:

1. What’s in a name? The original name was “The First Rehabilitation Insurance Company of America.” The company later changed its name to the name we know today: ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company. 

Before their rebrand, brokers had been asking for many years, “Why the name First Rehab?” Well, First Rehab was formed in 1972 to be the first of its kind to provide physical rehabilitation insurance. But that all changed when physical rehabilitation was folded in as a covered medical expense. As a NY-based company where statutory short-term disability benefits were required, First Rehab was able to adjust its course and sold its first New York DBL (Disability Benefits Law) policy in 1974 – and the rest, as they say, is history!  

The company became ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company in 2014.  A change in name to help better reflect who they are and what they do: their commitment to their clients and – with plans of growing beyond New York – to have a name that fosters a more nationwide identity.

2. Today, ShelterPoint is focusing the majority of its business efforts on Paid Family and Medical Leave (PFML) programs across the United States.

This may not be a surprise for New York brokers since, in fact, ShelterPoint is the market leader in New York PFML, with over 20% market share, according to the GC Smith Group’s 2021 PFL Market Survey.

But perhaps you may not know that ShelterPoint is leveraging its expertise in NY to provide coverage for these programs in the growing number of states with similar required benefits. Currently, they offer private plan coverage in:

• • New Jersey 
  • Massachusetts
  • Connecticut

ShelterPoint has been servicing statutory New Jersey Temporary Disability Insurance policies since 2003 and has been an approved private plan for the Paid Family & Medical Leave programs in Massachusetts and Connecticut since these programs were launched.

With Colorado on the horizon, and as more states are starting to require these types of programs, ShelterPoint is evaluating each opportunity for private carriers to contribute with their industry expertise.

3. Employees tend to stay with ShelterPoint

Many of us are already aware that some ShelterPoint employees have been with the company for quite some time – some brokers have had the same ShelterPoint Sales Rep for many years, forging deep relationships, even up to the rep’s retirement!  ShelterPoint shared some interesting data points on employee tenure.

For example, did you know that the average length of employment for ShelterPoint employees is about almost 7 years?  In comparison, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the median number of years that salaried workers stay with their employer is a little over 4 years.²

Almost ¼ of employees have been with ShelterPoint for over 10 years³. 

These numbers would have been even higher for ShelterPoint just a few years ago. However, the company has grown substantially since the launch of New York’s Paid Family Leave program, having added over 50% of its workforce since 2017 to service Paid Family (and Medical) Leave policies and claims.

When asked what has kept them at ShelterPoint for so long, many of the longer-tenured employees echo these key themes:

1. ShelterPoint is a family-oriented company with a genuine feeling of togetherness and community that values work-life balance.

2. Flexible hybrid and remote work environment that allows each team to set parameters that work best for their dynamics.

3. Stable career development. It was interesting to learn that many of the upper management employees started off in entry-level positions – whether within the department they’re now leading or in a different capacity, which reflects ShelterPoint’s dedication to supporting their employees’ cross-functional interests and growth.

4. Employees at ShelterPoint enjoy helping make a difference and feel a sense of purpose knowing that their work positively impacts people’s lives.

Katrin Atienza, VP Marketing, started as Marketing Manager 20 years ago as the only Marketing person at the company. Now a team of 7 – and soon 10 – she shares how much she has enjoyed building the department from the ground up and being able to make a difference together with her team. “Although we’ve been growing so much, we’ve managed to stay true to ourselves. Even remote work in the pandemic couldn’t hamper our teamwork, collaboration, and dedication. We virtually lifted each other up and turned a challenge into an opportunity – and that’s what we excel at here at ShelterPoint in general. We have this great spirit of banding together.”

Kathleen McAuliffe, another long-term employee who started as an Executive Assistant to the President in 1990 and is now SVP Client Services & Administration, has experienced one of the biggest staff increases among the various departments at ShelterPoint. No matter the amount of growth, her team strives to make a positive impact when it matters most. “Our people and culture are the right recipe for a business like ours – every day we get to witness the difference we are making in the lives of working families who go out on short-term disability or paid family leave. It’s a big responsibility that feels very rewarding.”

You may even personally know ShelterPoint’s longest-tenured employee at 35 years –  – David Epstein! In 1987, David began as a Sales Rep covering Brooklyn, rising through the ranks to where he is today as SVP Sales. “They used to call me ‘The Kid’,” David explains, “I’m certainly not ‘The Kid’ anymore!” he joked. Today he leads a sales team of 18, including a field force, telemarketing, and sales support. The field force has begun returning to in-person sales visits and attending our industry events. With the success of the virtual environment, David has recently expanded the PFML (paid family and medical leave) sales team outside of NYS, which operates mostly virtually to support the company’s expansion to new markets.

4. ShelterPoint continues to sell exclusively through independent brokers and agents.

When asked what sets ShelterPoint apart from other statutory disability carriers, he replies, “In the early days, no other carrier had the feet on the street like we did – and still do – for DBL in New York. We just really value our relationships with agents and brokers here at ShelterPoint.”

ShelterPoint focuses the majority of its outreach to brokers, educating them on the ins and outs of the statutory coverages to help brokers and their clients easily navigate the statutory process and make well-informed decisions. 

5. Employees feel like a family, and they like to have fun

One employee, Ellen Komis in Broker Licensing with 34 years at ShelterPoint, appreciates that “We’re all in this together. No matter the good or the bad, we are unified.”

In conversations with long-term employees, sentiments like that were shared by other employees. While reminiscing, they shared their love for food (hardly any day would go by in which someone didn’t bring in something to share) and their knack for office events (from international potlucks to the big Fall Fest/Halloween party with legendary costume contests and from bake sales for charity to food/toy drives) that helped instill ShelterPoint’s unique culture.

ShelterPoint’s 50th Anniversary Celebration

What better reason to celebrate than a big milestone like the company’s 50th anniversary?  

“It’s really the first time we have been able to be all together again since our Holiday party back in 2019,” explains Stephanie Haber, a ShelterPoint employee of 12 years. “We work hard, but it’s nice to see familiar faces in person and meet the many new employees who have joined us recently!”   

ShelterPoint shared some photos from their employee-only event that took place this September on Long Island. 

What’s Next for ShelterPoint

ShelterPoint has come a long way from the days of hand-typed policies and keeping track of producer numbers by writing them down in a notebook.  Today, the company insures over 184,000 NY employers with over 1.9 million employees for their New York DBL/PFL coverage alone.¹

CEO Richard White has been leading ShelterPoint by example for 13 years and has helped instill leadership values and a prudent growth mindset that provides a stable path for the company’s future endeavors. He states, “I am excited about the 50th-anniversary celebration. What a wonderful way to show our appreciation and say ‘Thanks’ to everyone at ShelterPoint. As I consider our past, I am struck by a remarkable legacy of accomplishment, one that led ShelterPoint to become New York’s largest statutory disability provider, and an agile and highly capable firm. I am proud of how skillfully we launched NY PFL, which required company-wide collaboration and touched every business process. Shortly thereafter, our response to the pandemic showed our resilience in the face of uncertainty by seamlessly transitioning the entire company to remote work. The power of our culture shined through and allowed us to emerge out of the crisis as a stronger company, and post our best year ever in 2021. Now, as we look into the future, we know there will always be twists and turns along the road. But ShelterPointers are a unique group of employees, who are ready for the next 50 years.”

We wish them well at this important milestone and look forward to celebrating with ShelterPoint at future milestones as they continue to make their mark on the statutory short-term disability and paid family leave benefit space. 

*The ShelterPoint family of companies operates under the “ShelterPoint” name strictly as a marketing name, and no legal significance is expressed or implied. The ShelterPoint family of companies consists of ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company, a NY-domiciled carrier, and its wholly-owned subsidiary ShelterPoint Insurance Company, a FL-domiciled carrier, depending on the state. ShelterPoint is a registered service mark.

¹Based upon ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company policyholder and certificate holder count as of 02/26/20.

²Employee Tenure Summary, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Sept 22, 2020, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/tenure.nr0.htm

3: ShelterPoint HR data, Aug 2022

Paid Family Leave: Gaining Traction in New York and Beyond

Anupam Garg

2022-08-18T07:00:00.0000000 2022-11-15T09:23:09.7430000

Reprinted with permission from Insurance Advocate Magazine, August 2022

New York Paid Family Leave Program – Evolution

State-mandated Paid Family Leave (PFL) took effect in New York in 2018, providing eligible employees with job-protected, partially paid time off to bond with a new child, care for a seriously ill family member, or attend to family matters due to a military exigency.  The program gradually phased in over a four-year period, starting with benefits set at 50% of an employee’s average weekly wage (AWW), capped at 50% of the NY State Average Weekly Wage (NYSAWW). The maximum amount of leave in 2018 was 8 weeks. 

By comparison, at the end of the phase-in period in 2021, the maximum leave duration reached 12 weeks, with benefits set at 67% of an employee’s AWW, capped at 67% of the NYSAWW.  While the benefit is expected to remain at this percentage level, the cap can change every year since it is based on the NYSAWW.  And New York can, of course, make enhancements to the program any time, such as COVID-related benefits 2 years ago and the addition of siblings as qualifying family members for leaves starting on or after January 1, 2023.

While PFL is governed by the State, the coverage in New York is primarily provided by private insurance carriers in a unique public-private partnership.  Notably, when tailoring their program for their predominantly small business communities, New York didn’t require employer contributions for Paid Family Leave benefits – consequential in a state where small shops make up 99.8% of all New York businesses.¹

The Road to PFL

As New York’s largest Disability Benefits Law (DBL) carrier², ShelterPoint³ recognized soon enough that the introduction of PFL would present a major change in NY’s insurance landscape with uncertainty and disruption for carriers, brokers, and employers alike.

In the midst of this backdrop, ShelterPoint played a significant role in preparing New York for Paid Family Leave. It worked closely with the insurance and regulatory community to help make the public-private partnership successful and provided New Yorkers with a wealth of easy-to-understand resources on the road to PFL – such as an independent, educational Paid Family Leave microsite (fully stocked with educational resources), as well as expert panels and webinars.  Let’s not forget: New York insurance brokers and agents also played an important role in keeping their clients informed of the new requirements and deadlines.
 

New York Paid Family Leave Program – Adoption

An inside look at ShelterPoint claims data suggests that overall PFL utilization has been steadily growing, with an almost 42% growth in NY PFL claims overall since the inception of this program (not including any COVID-related quarantine claims and adjusted for growth in covered lives during that period – the same adjustments are consistently applied to other numbers referenced in this article.)⁴.  This was not unforeseen since the program was designed to roll out over 4 years, and a steady adoption during the phase-in period was anticipated. Utilization, as well as adoption rates, vary drastically depending the type of leave. Bonding Leave remained the most utilized leave type as it represented 76.7% of PFL claims in 2018, and remained steady at 76.4% in 2021.  

Bonding Leave

Let’s look at a few key learnings and trends in Bonding Leave more closely. 

1. Shifting composition of Bonding Leave utilization among men & women

A trend among ShelterPoint claimants has emerged since PFL began in 2018 -- the usage rate between men and women has been going up at different rates: while both, more moms and dads, have been taking leave to bond with their new child, the number of dads taking Bonding Leave has increased faster than the number of moms.

The number of dads taking leave almost doubled from 2018 to 2021 (they saw a 93% increase). This also increased the share of dads among parents on bonding leave from 28% in PFL’s inaugural year to 31% in the following year and reached 38% in 2021. (Surprised the 93% jump in bonding claims from dads only translates to a 10-point share increase? This is because there is a much larger pool of claims from moms that dilute the impact dads’ claims have on the total number.) The growth possibly indicates that the matured benefit level may now be a more adequate partial salary replacement and/or that it may be becoming more widely acceptable for men to take this type of leave.

Conversely, while moms accounted for over 3/4 of ShelterPoint’s PFL bonding claims in 2018, they made up just under 2/3 of bonding claims in 2021.

2. Moms and dads are not taking the full leave allowed

In 2018, the average leave length among moms was 7 weeks out of a maximum leave length of 8 weeks, i.e., they used 88% of their available time. In 2019, the maximum leave went up to 10 weeks, with moms using on average 85% of their allowed leave, i.e., 8.5 weeks of bonding leave. This percentage held up steadily through 2021, when the program reached its final stage with a 12-week maximum duration, resulting in an average leave duration of 10.2 weeks for moms. So, while longer leave became available and moms started taking longer leave, moms did not max out on their leave, and the amount used out of the maximum allowed time remained fairly proportionate.

Dads followed a similar, proportionate growth pattern of leave taken compared to time allowed: from 56% of leave time available to dads in 2018 to 57% in 2021. While, yes, dads took consistently shorter leaves than moms (4.5 out of 8 weeks in 2018 and 6.9 out of 12 weeks in 2021), their leave durations did increase and almost reached the same length moms had taken in PFL’s first year.

This is another indicator of a slow trend toward a more equal share of bonding with the new baby or, adopted or foster child, which also qualifies as Bonding Leave.

3. More support for moms during the postpartum period

The fact that more men were bonding during the first year of a baby’s life is crucial!  Studies show the quality of both maternal and paternal bonds during early infancy is one of the most important predictors of a child’s eventual ability to thrive in adulthood.⁵

While the postpartum period may be a joyful time, it may also be a stressful and overwhelming time for moms⁶.  While the program has been helping a growing number of moms in New York, nationwide, there may still be financial pressures resulting in a shorter maternity leave. A survey conducted for the U.S. Department of Labor, reports that nearly 25% of U.S. moms return to work less than 2 weeks after giving birth⁷ 

This nationwide trend may result in health risks as obstetricians generally recommend a new mom wait at least 6 weeks after giving birth to return to work, but many advise waiting 12 weeks. Returning to work too early after childbirth can cause extreme exhaustion in a new mother as well as increase the risk for postpartum depression.⁸

This may be why the Paid Family Leave program is so impactful for working moms in New York, with its partial wage replacement, job protections, and 12-week leave length. 

Caregiver Leave: Women Continue to Take on the Brunt of Caregiver Duties

While Caregiver Leave also started to get leveraged more by men in 2021 compared to 2018, it is at a smaller growth rate than for Bonding Leave. Caregiving still continues to be shouldered by women with 68% requesting Paid Family Leave for caregiving in 2021 compared to 73% in 2018; conversely, men went up from 27% to 32% of all caregiver leave for the same time period.

This does, however, suggest that men are increasingly taking a greater role in caregiving duties – as in bonding leave.

While the leave duration among caregivers has gone up between 2018 and 2021, men and women used about the same amount of time.  For example, in 2018 the average duration leave among men and women was 4 weeks; in 2021, that grew about 50% to 6 weeks on average.  Both men and women took a little over 6 weeks.  Six weeks still falls far short of the 12 weeks caregivers are eligible to receive.

PFL for Military Exigencies

PFL is also available for eligible employees who have to attend to family matters due to their family member’s ‘qualifying military event.’ Under PFL, qualifying military events occur when a spouse, domestic partner, child, or parent is, for example, on active duty, called to active duty status, or notified of an impending call to active duty. 

ShelterPoint receives few claims for military exigencies.  In fact, overall incidence for military exigency claims was 0.03%.

Paid Family Leave Among the States

Since New York began providing benefits in 2018, Washington, Massachusetts, and Connecticut have set up their own Paid Family (and Medical) Leave programs, following the early pioneers of similar state-mandated programs like California, New Jersey, and Rhode Island. It is worth noting that each state envisioned and implemented their programs in different ways, with New York being the prime example of a successful implementation in which the State governs and regulates the program while relying on the expertise of the insurance industry to assure smooth administration of their mandated Paid Family Leave program.

Paid Family Leave in the United States is a relatively new phenomenon.  While traditional short-term disability programs began initially in 6 states/jurisdictions⁹ as far back as 1942, Paid Family Leave began in the 21^st century in the United States.  More recent Paid Family Leave programs, especially in states that didn’t have required short-term disability programs in place, include a Medical Leave component which is a comparable statutory short-term disability solution. Those are usually described as Paid Family & Medical Leave (PFML). 

So, while state-mandated Paid Family & Medical Leave, Paid Family Leave, and Short-Term Disability laws all reflect the same general concept, they vary by state. Benefit amounts, durations, reasons for leave, etc. differ from state to state – even down to the name of the respective program.

State Plan and Private Plan Model

As mentioned earlier, the New York model of a quasi- public/private partnership is novel, and has not been adopted in quite the same way by other states thus far. 

While New York technically has a public option for PFL through the NYS Insurance Fund, New York’s long-standing and well-established private market for statutory short-term disability, DBL, (since 1949), has proven itself as the primary solution for PFL coverage, coupled with the fact that NY businesses don’t get coverage by default but rather have to actively secure coverage to remain compliant.

This opt-in model has adapted well to Paid Family Leave and, in fact, has proven itself advantageous for New York’s insurance industry, spurring economic competition and diversification for the benefit of New York’s business community, employer and employee alike. Managed by the Worker’s Compensation Board and the Department of Financial Services, the DBL/PFL program runs like a well-oiled machine between the state and industry, and has been great for insurance brokers and agents as well.

Some of the other states only provide a State Plan, and others, like New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts, allow for Private Plans (which includes equivalent, fully insured coverage from private carriers as well as self-insured options). However, many of those states place employers in their State Plan by default and require an active opt-out process in order for employers to provide private plan or self-funded PFML coverage to their employees. Depending on the employer’s situation, selecting a Private Plan can be a valuable option over the State Plan and may provide extra advantages including competitive pricing, and being able to rely on the private carrier’s experience, scalability, and agility to manage statutory benefits coverage – and may be an entirely new revenue stream for insurance brokers and agents.

States Adopting Paid Family Leave

Other states, too, have chosen to not wait for the U.S. federal government to come to a consensus and have enacted their own versions of a Paid Family Leave program.  Oregon and Colorado are setting up the parameters of their programs now, and are expected to go live in 2023 and 2024 respectively.  Maryland and Delaware just enacted their PFML laws in 2022 for future implementation. Paid Family Leave is soon to be established in almost 25% of the United States (by population), at the state level.  This raises many questions that will need to be addressed, such as the possibility of a national standard with regulation on the federal level or the state level. Nevertheless, two things are for sure: Paid Family Leave is being used here in New York, and, at least for now, states are marching forward with their own programs to address this important need.

To read the full article in the Insurance Advocate Magazine, please click here.

Footnotes

1. SBA, Small Business Statistics, 2018.

2. State of New York Workers’ Compensation Board, form DB-680, 2016 – applies to ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company only.

3.  The ShelterPoint family of companies operates under the “ShelterPoint” name strictly as a marketing name, and no legal significance is expressed or implied. The ShelterPoint family of companies consists of ShelterPoint Life Insurance Company, a NY-domiciled carrier, and its wholly-owned subsidiary ShelterPoint Insurance Company, a FL-domiciled carrier, depending on the state. ShelterPoint is a registered service mark.

4 For the purposes of this article, whenever statistics are provided for the Paid Family Leave program, it refers only to ShelterPoint’s claims data and not the program as a whole in New York State.

5 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5330336/

6 https://www.medicaldaily.com/shorter-maternity-leave-linked-postpartum-depression-returning-work-after-12-weeks-may-lead-poor

7 https://www.thebump.com/a/moms-return-work-2-weeks-postpartum , 2012 In These Times Survey for the U.S. Department of Labor

8 https://www.modernmom.com/2c3305a2-051f-11e2-9d62-404062497d7e.html

9. California, Rhode Island, New Jersey, New York, Hawaii, Puerto Rico

Q&A with… Richard White

Anupam Garg

2009-09-28T07:00:00.0000000 2021-12-28T08:32:28.2470000

"Richard A. White no stranger to New York, as a former Guardian and New York Life Vice President, takes the helm of First Rehab Life from John Baldwin, a long time leader of the enterprise who brought it to “life” and grew it over a period of about 30 years.

Mr. White’s background includes 25 years of experience in creating and implementing effective strategies for business growth, diversification, product development, sales expansion and operational excellence for several leading insurance companies. White’s most recent role was as Executive Vice President of Domestic Markets with Pan American Life Insurance Company in New Orleans where he was responsible for all businesses in the United States and Puerto Rico. This included employee benefits as well as a focus in selling individual products to the U.S. Hispanic market. While with Pan American, White instituted a turn-around of underperforming product segments while also increasing revenues in the core limited medical business by almost 40%."

Click here to read the full article!