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ACROSS SESSIONS
- Subject Index: Since 1995
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Developed and maintained by the Division of Legislative Automated Systems.
2004 SESSION
Chairman: William C. Wampler, Jr.
Date of Meeting: February 2, 2004
Time and Place: 1/2 hour after adjournment-Senate Room B
Patron: Puckett
Insurance; Fire Programs Fund; assessment on motor vehicle insurance. Requires insurance companies that write motor vehicle insurance to pay an assessment of one percent of the total direct gross premium income from such insurance. The assessments will be paid into the Fire Programs Fund, which is administered by the Department of Fire Programs under policies established by the Virginia Fire Services Board.
Patron: Williams
Insurance; refusal to accept assignments prohibited; physicians. Prohibits an insurer from refusing to accept an assignment of benefits made to a physician. For consistency, this bill also applies the prohibition to the state employees' health plan. There is already a prohibition against refusing to accept assignments of benefits made to dentists and oral surgeons. This bill would expand the prohibition to include assignments made to physicians.
Patron: Watkins
Unemployment compensation; offset for retirement benefits. Eliminates the offset for Social Security or Railroad Retirement benefits where the unemployment trust fund has a solvency level of 50 percent or more. At solvency levels below 50 percent, the offsets of 50 percent of retirement benefits remain in place.
Patron: Reynolds
Unemployment compensation benefits; termination before resignation. Provides that where an employee gives notice of resignation, and the employer subsequently terminates him effective prior to the date specified in the resignation notice, the employer shall be liable for a maximum of two weeks of benefits (absent a finding of good cause for the employee's resignation or misconduct). Under current law, if an employer does not terminate an employee immediately after the employee gives notice of his resignation, but eventually terminates him prior to the specified resignation date, the employer is fully liable for payment of unemployment compensation benefits.
Current law in effect empowers an employee to establish a contract of for cause employment by allowing him to give advanced notice of a resignation date and collect unemployment benefits if the employer terminates him at some point during that extended notice period rather than immediately after receiving the resignation notice. At the same time, the bill retains the protections of the current law by permitting an employee to obtain up to two weeks of benefits, thus supporting those employees who give a two-week notice of resignation, are terminated on that basis, and face a two-week delay in starting their new employment.
Patron: Hawkins
Activation of medical malpractice joint underwriting association. Requires, by January 1, 2005, the State Corporation Commission to activate a joint underwriting association for the members of any class, type, or group of providers of health care who, between January 1, 2003, and January 1, 2004, have not been covered for any period of time by reason of insolvency of their previous carrier or cannot purchase or cannot afford to purchase medical malpractice insurance in the voluntary market. The Commission will establish criteria to determine the eligibility of any such class, type, or group of providers of health care for purchasing such coverage.
Patron: Stolle
Workers' Compensation Insurance; self-insurers; deposit to secure payment. Lists the financial instruments that a self-insuring employer can provide to the Workers' Compensation Commission (Commission) if the Commission requires that a deposit be made by the employer to secure the payment of workers' compensation liabilities as they are incurred.
Patron: Stolle
Virginia Consumer Protection Act; cure offers for consumer disputes involving motor vehicle purchases. Defines "cure offer" as a written offer of one or more things of value made by a supplier, and the offer is delivered to a person, or an attorney representing the person, claiming to have suffered a loss as a result of a consumer transaction for the purchase of a motor vehicle from the supplier. A cure offer must be reasonably calculated to remedy a loss claimed by the person, and it must include a minimum additional amount equaling 10 percent of the value of the cure offer or $500, whichever is greater, as compensation for inconvenience, fees, expenses, or other costs that such person may incur in relation to such loss. However, the minimum additional amount need not exceed $2,500. The bill prohibits the admission of a cure offer in any proceeding initiated under the Virginia Consumer Protection Act unless the cure offer is delivered by a supplier to the person, or an attorney representing the person, claiming loss prior to the filing of the supplier's initial responsive pleading in such proceeding. If the requirements of the definition of cure offer are met and the cure offer is delivered by the supplier as required, the cure offer shall be admissible when offered by the supplier. The supplier shall not be liable for such person's attorney's fees and court costs incurred following delivery of the cure offer unless the actual damages found to have been sustained and awarded, without consideration of attorney's fees and court costs, exceed the value of the last cure offer that was not accepted by the person claiming loss.
Patron: Williams
Virginia Telephone Privacy Protection Act; telephone solicitation. Adds wireless telephones with a Virginia area code to the list of those telephone numbers that a telephone solicitor cannot call at any time other than between 8:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. A telephone solicitor is prohibited from calling a telephone number when such number has been placed on the federal Do Not Call Registry. The bill provides using a version of the federal Do Not Call Registry that was obtained no more than three months prior to the date of the telephone solicitation as an affirmative defense to an action brought for a violation of this section. The bill requires telephone solicitors to play a prerecorded identification message that states only the name and telephone number of the person on whose behalf the telephone solicitation call was being made, and that the call was for “telemarketing purposes,” whenever a live person is not available within two seconds of completing the greeting.
Patron: Deeds
Additional assessment on premium income from motor vehicle insurance policies. Provides for an assessment of one percent of the direct premium income from motor vehicle insurance policies. Moneys collected from the assessment shall be deposited into the State Police Training and Retention Fund to create and support programs for the training and retention of state police officers.
Patron: O'Brien
Insurance; Virginia Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriting Association. Establishes the Virginia Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriting Association, which will provide a market for medical malpractice insurance for any provider of health care that cannot otherwise obtain insurance in a form and at a premium acceptable to the provider. On or before September 30, 2004, the directors of the association must submit a plan of proposed operation to the State Corporation Commission for its approval. The bill also eliminates the stabilization reserve fund, but permits rates to include an appropriate premium surcharge based on past and prospective loss and expense experience.
Patron: Wagner
Minimum wage. Provides that no public body may require the payment of a minimum wage that exceeds the federal minimum wage to the employees of an employer, or his subcontractor, contracting to provide goods or services to the public body.
Patron: Stosch
Banking and finance; subsidiary trust companies and trust company holding companies. Permits ownership of nonvoting stock of trust subsidiaries by companies other than banks or bank holding companies. The bill eliminates the requirement that a trust company holding company also control a securities-related company. "Control" is defined as ownership of 25 percent or more of the voting stock of a trust company. The bill also authorizes acquisition of a Virginia trust company by any bank holding company or any company having a trust subsidiary as permitted by federal law or the law of another state.
Patron: Wagner
Workers' Compensation Commission; powers. Provides that with respect to all matters within its jurisdiction, the Commission shall have the power of a court of record to administer oaths, to compel the attendance of witnesses and the production of documents, to punish for contempt, to appoint guardians pursuant to Title 31 and to enforce compliance with its lawful orders and awards.
Patron: Wagner
Unemployment compensation; minimum qualifying earnings. Increases by $1,000 the amount that an employee must have earned (from $2,500 to $3,500) in the two highest earnings quarters of his base period (the first four of the last five calendar quarters) combined to be eligible for unemployment compensation benefits.
Patron: Ticer
Insurance; mandated healthcare coverage; hearing aids for minors. Requires the state health plan, health insurers, health maintenance organizations, corporations providing health care coverage subscription contracts, and Medicaid to provide coverage for hearing aids and related services for children from birth to age 5 when a licensed audiologist prescribes such hearing aids and related services. Such coverage shall include one hearing aid per hearing-impaired ear, up to a cost of $1,400, every 36 months. The insured may choose a higher priced hearing aid and pay the difference in cost above $1,400. No copayment will apply. Hearing aids are not to be considered durable medical equipment.
Patron: Martin
Mandated health insurance benefits. Places a five-year moratorium on new health insurance mandates during which time no additional mandates can be added to Virginia law.
Patron: Cuccinelli
Voice-over-Internet Protocol; State Corporation Commission; regulation; taxation. Excludes Voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) from regulation by the State Corporation Commission (SCC) by excluding VoIP from the definition of telecommunications service and telephone service. The bill also limits the definition of telecommunications service and telephone service for purposes of local taxation. State taxes on telecommunications and telecommunications companies as provided in § 58.1-400.1 (Minimum tax on telecommunications companies) and Chapter 26 (Taxation of Public Service Corporations) of Title 58.1 refer to the power of the SCC to authorize a person to provide telephone service. Exempting VoIP from the regulation of the SCC will also exempt these services from those taxes.