ALTA BEST PRACTICES

BEST PRACTICES IN TITLE INSURANCE AND SETTLEMENT:         

Mission Statement:  Protect consumers and promote quality services by practicing the business of title insurance and settlement in compliance with State and Federal laws and regulations, while adhering to the highest standards in the industry in professionalism and best practices to provide positive and informative settlement experiences for the consumer and related service providers.  We adopt the Best Practices of the American Land Title Association.      

Best Practice Pillar I:  Establish and maintain current licenses as required to conduct the business of title insurance and settlement services in the State of Florida.       

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice Pillar I.  Lead Title, LLC maintains a license to do business in the State of Florida through the Florida Department of Financial Services.  Lead Title, LLC maintains licensed principals for the company as required under Florida State Regulations, with both principals being Florida Licensed Attorneys.  Lead Title, LLC maintains a license to use the ALTA promulgated forms through its membership in ALTA.      

Best Practice Pillar II:  Adopt and maintain appropriate written procedures and controls for Escrow Trust accounts allowing for electronic verification of reconciliations.  This Pillar provides for appropriate and effective escrow controls and training for staff to aid the Company in meeting client expectations and all legal requirements for the safeguard of consumer and client funds.  The procedures adopted help ensure accuracy and minimize the risk of loss of client funds.  Segregation of duties in trust accounting is followed internally.                  

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice Pillar II.  Lead Title, LLC maintains separate operating and escrow accounts. Escrow accounts are reconciled with trial balances at least monthly using three-way reconciliation that are then sent to the underwriter along with supporting bank statements.   Deposits and disbursements are reconciled daily with two-way reconciliation per file.  The reconciliations are only done by the principals, the two licensed attorneys are experienced and trained in account reconciliation and each reconciliation is reviewed by each principal separately.  Management reviews each electronically stored reconciliation report.  Escrow and Trust Accounts are properly titled.  Positive and negative file balances are documented.  Only authorized and licensed employees may conduct settlements, authorize transactions and former employees are immediately barred from any activity and removed officially from all access to any file.  Escrow accounts are only held in federally insured financial institutions and care is taken to make sure the limits of such accounts are not exceeded.  The company utilizes Positive pay where available, ACH blocks, and International wire blocks on all accounts.  Only the two principals, who are both licensed attorneys, are authorized signatories on escrow accounts. Both principals check the balance of the escrow accounts on daily basis to ensure the funds held in escrow are secured. Training and conference sessions are conducted one on one monthly as to any issues that turn up in the reconciliation process and at least quarterly during the year to settlement/closing personnel through various methods in person or on-line.       

Best Practice Pillar III:  Adopt and maintain written privacy and information security program to protect Non-public Personal Information as required by local, state, and federal law.  Federal and state laws (including the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act) require title companies to develop a written information security program that describes the procedures they employ to protect Non-public Personal Information. The program must be appropriate to the Company's size and complexity, the nature and scope of the Company's activities, and the sensitivity of the customer information the Company handles. A Company evaluates and adjusts its program in light of relevant circumstances, including changes in the Company's business or operations, or the results of security testing and monitoring.                 

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice Pillar III. The company maintains separate operating and escrow accounts . Any Non-public Personal Information physically maintained by Lead Title, LLC is accessible only by authorized employees. Any electronically maintained Non-public Personal Information, is done so on secure servers with access restricted to only authorized employees. Storing data on removable media such as smart phones, USB drives and disks is controlled, and password protected. Documents containing Non-public Personal Information is transmitted from Lead Title, LLC using our underwriter approved vendor software specializing in safe delivery of documents using encryption and password protection.  Lead Title, LLC maintains its own document shredder or contracts the service to a shredding vendor to ensure disposal of Non-public Personal Information.  Lead Title, LLC maintains and test its written Disaster Recovery Plan on an annual basis.  All existing and new employees are trained on information security.  PLT vendors who handle courtesy closings or witness closings and also come into possession of Non-public Personal Information must have acknowledged in writing that they comply with Federal and State privacy laws and Lead Title, LLC's information security plan.       

Best Practice Pillar IV:  Adopt standard real estate settlement procedures and policies that ensure compliance with Federal and State Consumer Financial Laws as applicable.  Adopting appropriate policies and conducting ongoing employee training helps ensure the Company can meet state, federal, and contractual obligations governing the Settlement Procedures to meet this best practice.       

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice Pillar IV.  Lead Title, LLC's policy requires its closing/settlement employees to submit documents for recording within one business day of disbursement using e-recording when available and tracking the documents as they make their way through the recorder's office.  Lead Title, LLC accurately quotes rates based upon the state filed premium rates, its own rate sheets, and promulgated rate sheets to ensure that consumers are being charged the appropriate premiums.                     

Best Practice Pillar V:   Adopt and maintain written procedures related to title policy production, delivery, reporting and premium remittance to help ensure title companies can meet their legal and contractual obligations.                 

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice Pillar V:  Lead Title, LLC issues and delivers policies within 30 days of the later of (i) the date of Settlement, or (ii) the date that the terms and conditions of title insurance commitment are satisfied.  Lead Title, LLC tracks its orders to assure that policy issuance standards are met through reports generated through its software and by tracking its paid invoices for title insurance premiums. Lead Title, LLC reports policies through its underwriter’s on-line policy reporting systems and reports the issuance of policies by the last day of the month following the month in which the insured transaction was settled.  Lead Title, LLC reviews all billings for premium from the underwriter and submits for adjustments within 30 days after receipt of the billing from the underwriter.  Lead Title, LLC pays all underwriter final invoices within 30 days after receipt of the final adjusted billing.         

Best Practices Pillar VI:  Appropriate levels of professional liability insurance ( E & O insurance) helps to ensure that tile agencies and settlement companies maintain the financial capacity to stand behind their professional services.  State law and title insurance underwriting agreements may require a company to maintain certain levels of E & O insurance, fidelity coverage or surety bonds.                 

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice VI.  Lead Title, LLC has E & O insurance with a $5,000 deductible and $1,000,000 in coverage for each claim with appropriate insurance against claims for errors and omissions in its work as a title insurance agent, including the closing process, and as an abstractor and provider of search information and examination of title.  Lead Title, LLC has Fidelity coverage for employee theft in the amount of $50,000 per incidence and a Surety Bond in the amount of $35,000 as required by the underwriter.  Lead Title, LLC tracks the time periods for renewal of its E & O insurance, Fidelity insurance, and Surety Bond that it may have acquired when available.  Lead Title, LLC reports all claims and issues that might be under its insurance policies timely and tracks all such incidents.  Its employees are trained annually to recognize claims and liability situations and to report them immediately to the principals.      

Best Practice Pillar VII:     A process for receiving and addressing consumer complaints helps to ensure that reported instances of poor service or non-compliance do not go undiscovered.      

Lead Title, LLC is compliant with Best Practice VII:  Lead Title, LLC has performed education of all personnel to recognize a complaint, to know how to acknowledge a complaint, and created a point of contact to report the complaint. Lead Title, LLC maintains a log of consumer complaints that includes whether and how the complaint was resolved.