Ingoglia seeks ‘transparency’ on property insurance payments to affiliates

TAMPA — Florida Chief Financial Officer Blaise Ingoglia is calling for more transparency when it comes to payments made between property insurers and their affiliated companies.

His comment came Thursday in a response to a story published jointly last month by the Orlando Sentinel and South Florida Sun Sentinel about an analysis commissioned by the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation (OIR) in 2022.

The report revealed that between 2017 and 2019, insurers in Florida claimed $432 million in losses but paid fees to their affiliate companies amounting to $1.3 billion.

The consultant who wrote the analysis also found that 20 insurers made affiliate payments exceeding the benchmark for what was “fair and reasonable.”

“I think there should be more transparency in the way that money flows back and forth between those affiliated companies,” Ingoglia said Wednesday during a press conference on the University of South Florida campus in north Tampa.

“I know that there was a bill that passed through the House years ago that did not pass through the Senate, but at the time I was the Banking and Insurance chair and I was championing that we put it up,” Ingoglia added. “I voted affirmatively [and] I put it up as chairman because I think that it is that important.”

Legislation has been sponsored for several years by lawmakers to create a framework for oversight of affiliates and their transactions with property insurers.

A bill (HB 1399) in the Florida House during the 2026 legislative session by Pinellas Republican Rep. Kim Berfield would have required insurers to weigh whether payments to affiliates are fair and reasonable, and to provide factors for OIR to decide. It was approved overwhelmingly in the Florida House, 106-3, but its Senate companion (SB 234) never received a hearing.

That proposal, sponsored by Sen. Carlos Guillermo Smith, D-Orlando, capped payments to affiliates at 20%.

“Step one is to offer some transparency when it comes to that,” Ingoglia said. “The other stuff we can debate. Until we have the information and we know exactly what is going on, then everything should follow after that.”

The newspapers reported that after they received an unredacted version of the analysis this summer, attorneys for the Florida Senate threatened both with “civil or criminal legal implications” if they refused to immediately shred the evidence.

The editors with both publications insisted they had obtained the records “legally and appropriately through the state’s public records process” and would not allow the Senate’s “threats to prevent us from reporting.”

The Tampa Bay Times initially reported about the secret analysis in February 2025 following a two-year wait for public records. It led to state lawmakers holding a single committee meeting in March 2025.

Political issue

Property insurance has emerged as a top issue in the Florida gubernatorial race between Republican Byron Donalds and Democrat David Jolly. Donalds has provided his own proposal but also contends the Florida property insurance market has stabilized due to legislative reforms passed earlier this decade — a talking point Gov. DeSantis and other legislative Republicans have repeated.

Jolly told reporters late last month following the Sentinel-Sun Sentinel story that the state’s insurance regulation system is “corrupt” and that he would use executive action to cap amounts insurers can shift into affiliated companies.

Homeowners’ insurance premiums increased by 75% between 2021 and 2025, according to a May 2026 report by the Coalition for Insurable Future.