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Allstate Insurance is back in the business of selling new policies, two and a half days after a court ruled the state could penalize the company for failing to turn over its rate setting and claims paying records. As Mike Vasilinda reports, the company may still be on the hook for the way it handled recent requests for information.

Hear it Here: Allstate is Back in Business

Shortly after two on Friday afternoon, the office of Insurance Regulation lifted its suspension of Allstate’s certificate to sell new policies. State regulators say the company promised to do better.

“Commissioner McCarty has agreed to lift the suspension as long as Allstate continues to comply with additional requests that might be necessary in the course of this investigation,” Ed Domansky with the Office of Insurance Regulation said.

Hundreds of thousands of documents have been turned over. At issue is how the company came to ask for a 42 percent rate hike last fall when most other companies were lowering rates. Also an issue is whether the company arbitrarily failed to pay 100 percent of a claim. The answer to both questions may lie in the documents the company finally turned over to regulators.

Allstate may still get another day in court. It has until Tuesday to ask the Florida Supreme Court if the lower courts upholding of the suspension was correct.

For now, the four month fight has put other companies on notice the state has the power to look at how they conduct business. Regulators say the message is a good one.

“Right now people should be thinking that Commissioner McCarty means business,” Domansky said. “He takes Florida law seriously and he is out to do whatever he can to protect the consumers here in Florida from potentially inappropriate business practices.”

Allstate could still face civil penalties from a state hearing officer over not turning the records over in a timely manner.