Automated Valuation Service (AVS)
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
General AVS Questions
What is the cost to receive a portfolio valuation file?
Valuation
files are part of your annual fee. You can request one at any time
with no additional fees involved.
Do I need to request a valuation file for each quarter or will
I receive it automatically?
Valuation files are ad-hoc
with the exception of the year-end file. For year-end, you will simply
make sure the correct option is checked under your year-end order.
Can these files be printed out so as to provide an audit trail?
All reports can be printed, and you can choose to receive a
CD-ROM of your year-end file at no additional cost.
If an insurance company had subsidiaries is there an additional
fee per company?
The Exhibit A of the license agreement
lists all subsidiaries that will be sharing the
portfolio associated with the agreement. The
assets of all companies listed are calculated
as part of the annual fee, so they may change
the fee level of the company, but there is no
charge per company.
What is the deadline for submitting files and requesting valuations?
Most customers submit
an update file with new CUSIPs
and then request a valuation.
This can be done at any time,
and both will process overnight
so your valuation file will be
available the next morning. The
exceptions to this time frame
are Month-, Quarter- and Year-end,
where the system will typically be shut down at 5 p.m. the last day of
the month and may remain down for processing for up to 2 days.
There is a security in my portfolio that is not showing any information
on my Valuation File.
Securities are dropped
from the VOS database as a result
of no Annual Update being filed.
Therefore, if you had a security
in your portfolio that had not
been updated, but had also not
been removed either manually
or through the batch update process,
it would continue to appear in
your portfolio but would show
no information.
I have a security in my AVS Valuation or Listing that has no
check digit.
When a check
digit and all other data
is missing from an AVS
Valuation or Listing,
that means that the security
is in the user's portfolio, but
is not available in the AVS Product.
It is intentionally put in the Valuation or Listing
as a sign to the user that the security is in
their portfolio even if AVS doesn't have any
other information about it.
*For specific direction on how to maintain your
Full-Access AVS System Portfolio, please see
your AVS User’s Guide.
Government Exempt Questions
Are U.S. government securities still exempt from filing?
With enhancements deployed in the ISIS August 2004 release, government
exempt securities, per P&P Manual Appendices 16, 17 and 18, will no
longer be displayed as Filing Exempt or Unconfirmed Filing Exempt. If you
have these government exempt securities in your AVS portfolio, then you’re
AVS Valuation and Listing files will display only the CUSIP information
for those securities. All other fields for the government exempt securities
will be blank. In addition, you will no longer be able to add these securities
to your portfolio.
Filing Exemption General Questions
What is FE?
FE, or filing exemption, is a new rule adopted by the NAIC which grants an exemption
from filing with the SVO for bonds and preferred stock that have been assigned
a current, monitored rating by an NRSRO. FE replaces the PE, or provisionally
exempt, rule. FE also includes filing exemption for public common stock, but
the basis for the exemption is the same as it was under the PE policy – that
is, public common stock that is not restricted to transferability and is listed
on the New York Stock Exchange or American Stock Exchange or traded on the
NASDAQ National Market System does not need to be filed with the SVO.
How is FE Defined?
FE is defined as follows: “FE means exempt from filing with the
SVO and is used by an insurance company to report an NAIC Designation
for an exempt security on the NAIC Financial Statement Blank. The administrative
symbol FE is used with an NAIC 1 through 6 Designation and signifies
that the reported security meets the criteria set forth in Part Four,
Section 2 (c) of this Manual and that the NAIC Designation was arrived
at by the insurer by converting the NRSRO rating(s) into a corresponding
NAIC Designation in accordance with Section 4 of the Appendix to this
Manual.”
What are the criteria for FE?
The only FE criterion is that the security, at the CUSIP/PPN/CINS level,
has an NRSRO rating. It is only necessary to have one NRSRO rating.
If more than one NRSRO rating exists, then the second-highest NRSRO
rating is used. Split ratings are resolved in accordance with the “second
highest” portion of the rule. Split-rated securities are not
filed with the SVO.
* For more detailed information regarding FE securities
or other SVO information, please visit the SVO page on the NAIC’s
Web site at http://www.naic.org/svo.htm. |
