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By Ruth Ann Woodley, September 22, 2009 7:56 am

RCL has completed its fifth annual Dental PPO Network Study, analyzing the value of networks for all major carriers in the dental insurance industry. This year’s study shows that discounts in dental preferred provider networks, the most popular type of plan sold, increased in 2008 after an unusual decrease in 2007. The number of dentists participating in the average network also continues to increase, although no longer at the extremely fast rate seen last year.

“Dental insurers seem to have returned to a more disciplined approach to fee increases, balancing the need to add the dentists that patients want to see with controlling the cost of their network,” said Ruth Ann Woodley, FSA, author of the study.  “They continue to closely watch total savings, on claims from dentists both in and out of their network, to optimize the balance between low costs and a broad network.”

The RCL study provides detailed data on each network’s discounts, network size and network utilization rates.  It is the only tool available in the dental insurance industry that allows carriers to see how their network results line up against competitors, and is based on claim data representing over 75% of the market.

Click here for the results:

Ruark Consulting 2008 Network Study Results

Please feel free to contact Ruth Ann to discuss the study results.

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By Tim Ruark, September 21, 2009 9:29 pm

Ruark Insurance Advisors (RIA)

RIA was founded in 1998 by our president, Tim Ruark.  Tim recognized that the equity-based product market was underserved in terms of financial management capacity.   He decided to work towards creating more capacity, while at the same time influencing the design of products to better manage the underlying financial risks.

RIA specializes in designing and implementing risk management solutions for the annuity product marketplace.  Our expertise in product design, risk analysis, reserve valuations, and risk transfer related to the guaranteed benefits in variable annuity products, the indexed benefits under equity indexed annuities, and capital relief for fixed annuities can help you bring products to market faster and better manage the underlying risks.

Company Profile

We are a creative organization dedicated to providing excellent product development and risk management solutions to our clients.  Because we are a small firm, we are able to offer professional expertise and exceptional service in a personal, down-to-earth manner.

Mission

Our goal is to become the leading clearinghouse for assessing and transferring risks associated with minimum guaranteed benefits within variable annuity and insurance products.

For additional information, please feel free to contact Tim by phone or email.