Consumer Group Sues CDI Over Complaint Data
The Life Insurance Consumer Advocacy Center (LICAC) has initiated legal action against the California Department of Insurance (CDI), claiming the agency is improperly withholding consumer complaint data.
According to the lawsuit, filed under the California Public Records Act, LICAC alleges the CDI has been unresponsive to its requests for consumer complaint information. The group states that the department initially claimed the data did not exist, but later contradicted this by citing that the same data appeared in a 2023 report issued by the insurance commissioner.
Following the contradiction, the CDI then cited a public records exemption but failed to provide a specific justification for withholding the data, prompting LICAC to take the matter to court. Brian Brosnahan, LICAC’s executive director, stated that the legal action was a result of months of unanswered requests for the information. “The group is asking the court to address what it views as a violation of public records law,” Brosnahan said. The group is seeking the data to support its work on policy reform and consumer protection.
The consumer advocacy group said the requested complaint data could help establish benchmarks for tracking complaints over time and evaluate the effects of recent legislative changes, including Senate Bill 263.
The CDI has faced criticism regarding its transparency concerning consumer complaint data. While the department directs consumers to its Consumer Complaint Center, where they can file complaints and track their status, specific figures for insurance complaints filed with the CDI in 2024 are not readily available in the public domain.
The most recent accessible data pertains to 2021, during which the CDI reported receiving 23,455 consumer assistance calls related to health care issues and reviewed 3,608 jurisdictional complaint cases.
Senate Bill 263, enacted in 2024, revised disclosure and “best interest” standards for agents selling annuities. LICAC opposed the law, arguing it allows insurance agents to claim they are working in consumers’ best interest while maintaining business practices that may not align with that standard. Brosnahan claimed at the time the bill passed that the measure enabled agents to present themselves as free of conflicts of interest when that may not be accurate.
