GDPR insurance review

In a recent presentation, the need to be sure your general liability insurance matches GDPR risks was emphasized.  There is no standard form or model for the industry that informs those who write commercial coverage.  That is likely to come as we advance into the world of GDPR, and of its spread throughout the world.

In the meantime, ask your insurance gurus to carefully review the exclusions in your current liability coverage for cyber events.  In addition, confirm if there is coverage in place for these matters:  privacy regulator actions, privacy breaches, violations of privacy laws and regulations, fines & penalties, the necessary $ limits. 

Coverage will likely also affect and promote certain processes and activities.  Think of these as underwriting strictures that allow the insurer to judge the risk according to how much diligence is being applied to GDPR risk related activities.  For example, DPIA results and actions to cure shortcomings.

A good time to call your insurance broker and complete this step in GDPR management.

The Prodigal Assignee

Imagine you have sent your talented Gen Y to a new city with a tidy lump sum check in their pocket (or on a prepaid VISA card, please!)  Maybe their only other move in life was back and forth to college with Dad and Mom’s help.  Now they are loosed on the world with important tasks to complete to get to their great new role on the golden career ladder.

But they aren’t sure where to turn for help, for services.  How do they get oriented to the new city?  What are the rental practices they need to understand?  Furniture? New driver’s license? Etc etc

Too often these future masters of the universe run out of money, and come back to their employer with hand out.  Do they get another stipend or are they really on their own?

Give them the tools at the front-end.  Complete analysis of reputable service providers.  Use your leverage to get them a better deal.  Remember, they are moving to help your company succeed.  

Compliance - keeping our promises

Much energy has been devoted to GDPR compliance; we have all learned that it’s now a GDPR world.  While we’re all exhaling a bit after the sprint to May 25, let’s not forget the day-day mundane need for contract management.  We promise in our agreements to comply with all laws, and so we should. Our clients - employers, relocation mgmt companies, suppliers - all expect promises to be kept.  Therefore, we need to keep a sharp eye on program activity and performance and align it with the promises made.

New customers with special needs, customer-specific pricing, customized services all are part and parcel of the flexible nature of relocation.  In each case we need to document and track as time goes by.  This is particularly true of agreements with “most favored pricing” clauses.  And don’t forget those regulatory changes that hit you know where!

Contract management is part of client service management.  Look often, be alert to impending renewal dates and added services that were promised at a client review.  Remember too that evergreen contracts are not always a good idea.

Diagnostics to Identify and Cure Risk

A periodic review of program home sale management may be useful.  Taking a selection of closed transactions through the process in place, compared to the process actually followed turns stones over into the sunlight.  For example, on a group of 100 files, find out how often brokers outside of standard were used and compare to inventory results. 

What if on the 100 files, 25% were outside of standard, resulting in 20% increase in home sale loss and  carry cost?  The aggregate result would lead to, once corrected, a substantial refinement in service results and program performance.

The exercise will likely reveal risk mitigation opportunities, whether due to process errors or changes in needs.  Process changes may be needed, systems or forms or reports may be added, policy changes may be identified, insurance coverage issues uncovered.  (inspections, CLUE, etc)  We can help.

All kinds of risk to manage

Relocation industry pros must manage many kinds of risk in handling mobility.  The newest issue on the list is GDPR and the proliferation of state rules - like the recent California law.

Here are a few other matters which require attention and process foundation to fully serve corporate clients: loss on sale from real estate, tax and expense management, computer, regulatory, property management, IT and business continuity, and insurable risk covered via liability insurance.

In today's rumbling world, we need to be very mindful of the risks presented by assignments in foreign countries.  We need to help employers profile candidates to see if they match the location.  Political risk - from unstable societies or internal conflict - requires special attention.  Also disease and epidemics and the ability of the host country to provide medical care. 

Take a wide view of the risks associated with mobility management.  A failed move may lead to loss of a key executive, an expensive proposition in any case

Fourth of July

So what was the world like in 1776?  Why were the American Revolution and Declaration of Independence so remarkable after all?

Europe was dominated by empires, ruled by kings, emperors and sultans.  The great powers were Great Britain, France, Austria, Russia, Prussia, and Turkey.  Most were ruled by absolute monarchs, beholden to no elected assembly who could curb their power and authority.

Democracy was, to some extent, a historical curiosity.  The Athenians (Greeks) had installed democratic government that ultimately failed; so too the Romans.  The Italian city-states had short-lived republics, but each had fallen either into despotism or had been overrun by the armies of France.  The Pope in Rome was not only a spiritual authority, he controlled territory and fielded armies. 

China and Japan were closed societies and mostly unknown to Europeans.  Descendents of Genghis Khan were losing their grip on India.  The African interior was almost totally unexplored.  Australia had just been discovered and would be colonized by convict immigrants.  North and South America were vast wildernesses with only the coasts and great river valleys settled.

People believed in demons and witches; deep, dark woods were terrifying.  Travel was very dangerous after dark, only candles and torches provided light.  Medicine was crude by our standards - intentional bleeding of the patient was a common treatment for all kinds of ailments.

Yet, it was also an era of great men and women.  Mozart, Beethoven and Napoleon were alive.  Catherine the Great ruled Russia.  Edmund Burke, the Scottish philosophers Adam Smith and David Hume, and Immanuel Kant, the influential German philosopher, were in their prime.

To our good fortune Jefferson and Madison, Adams, Franklin, and Hamilton can also be counted among the great.  But in the imagination of the age, George Washington, was the indispensable man.  It was his leadership and example as commander-in-chief, and later at the Constitutional Convention, that inspired the revolutionary generation. 

Where did our founders look for inspiration?  Well, to lessons of history about the rise and fall of nations.  They especially studied Greek and Roman history, for the ancients’ triumphs and failures.  They read and studied the influential Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle who wrote so often about politics. 

In the crucial years of the 1770s and 1780s, Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws helped guide those who would have to create a new government if the revolution was a success.  During the Constitutional Convention and the lively debate over ratification that followed, Montesquieu was a crucial authority on republics.

So, in a world of empires and absolute monarchs, at the edge of a vast continent, our forebears set out to overthrow the authority of Europe’s most powerful nation. 

Between 1775 and 1776, armed conflict with Britain broke out, and still there was wide disagreement on independence.  Many remained loyal to Britain.  It was not only the long odds of defeating Britain that caused uncertainty.  Declaring independence was treason, punishable by hanging. 

Yet, our founders took the momentous step and announced their independence from Britain boldly to the world: “all men are created equal”, “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”, governments “deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed”. 

For this new nation, the United States of America, sovereignty would reside in the citizen, not in kings and aristocrats.  To this Declaration of Independence 56 men signed their names and pledged “to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor”.

Something to think about this July 4^th.

NYC rental prices top $4000 per month

In recently published rental data, several neighborhoods of Manhattan turned in average rents of over $4000 per month for a 2 BR apartment.  The prices moderate as one travels into and beyond Morningside Heights.  But Midtown and, especially, Downtown still experience high demand, low vacancy and increasing prices.  All the major analysts expect the trend to continue through 2016.

And this, in spite of the fact that a 15% brokers fee is still charged by apartment finders - and that's 15% of the annual rental cost.

There are less expensive options in Brooklyn, Queens and the New Jersey towns just across the Hudson from Manhattan.  As in other parts of the country, increased building of new rental units cannot keep pace with demand.  The New York City economy is robust and the lure of the big city draws people from all over the world.