CNO Financial Group Inc. announced that Loretta Jacobs, FSA, MAAA, has been named Vice President of the Long Term Care business for Bankers Life and Casualty Company, reporting to Scott Perry, Chief Business Officer and President of Bankers Life. Jacobs joins Bankers from Ernst & Young, where she led their LTC actuarial audit and advisory services practice.

Law firm Williams Love O'Leary & Powers alleges Bankers Life and Casualty, a Chicago-based firm, is denying benefits to those who paid for long term health care insurance so they would have security in their old age. A class action lawsuit against the insurance company was filed in U.S. District Court in Portland. Pass attorney Chris Cauble, Portland attorney Mike Williams, plaintiff and Grants Pass resident Dennis Fallow, and plaintiff and Prineville resident David Youngbluth. Cauble and Williams drew attention to a 2008 multi-state investigation into consumer complaints against Conseco Inc., the parent company of Bankers Life. That action resulted in a settlement and agreement with Conseco that included a $2.3 million fine and $30 million in claims-handling improvements and restitution by the company. Oregon was not part of that multi-state action. In November 2012, the involved states found that Bankers Life was not complying with the terms of the 2008 settlement and another $3.2 million penalty was levied against it. The named representatives of the Oregon class action are Lorraine Bates and her husband Ehrman Bates, both of La Grande, Ore.; and Eileen Burk, of Sherwood, Ore., and her son David Youngbluth, of Prineville, Ore.

The Pennsylvania Insurance Department has announced the conclusion of a multi-state settlement agreement on the re-examination of Bankers Life and Casualty Company. The state will receive a share of the $3.2 million penalty levied against the insurance company. Bankers Life and Casualty Company, based in Illinois, was re-examined as a follow-up to a 2007 regulatory review. The review revealed concerns the company failed to sufficiently check changes to applications, inappropriately denied maximum benefit claims and failed to conduct timely claims investigations and claims settlements. These issues of non-compliance related to the annuities, long-term care and life insurance lines of business. Under the settlement, Bankers Life will pay $3,200,000 to be shared among the states that participated in the settlement. In addition to Pennsylvania, other lead states conducting the regulatory review included Illinois, Indiana, Florida and Texas.