Although most companies have detailed and similar policies against sexual harassment, employers often find themselves in murky territory when it comes to defining, proving, and disciplining sexual harassment in the workplace.

The result: Companies deal with complaints in vastly different ways. ``There are obviously laws against harassment, but defining exactly what that is is hard, and so is applying those laws to a particular set of facts and deciding what a company does about it," said Ron Peppe , a vice president of the Association of Corporate Counsel in Washington, D.C., an umbrella group for lawyers who work for in-house legal departments. ``So it's a gray area sometimes, because there are not hard and fast rules."

WASHINGTON—The commercial property/casualty insurance market isn’t showing any signs of hardening, according to a panel of insurer chief executive officers.

Price erosion is continuing, noted several participants in the Independent Insurance Agents and Brokers of America’s CEO panel discussion during the agent group’s national legislative conference and convention last Friday.

FORT COLLINS, Colo.—Seventeen named storms will form during the Atlantic hurricane season that officially begins Thursday, the Tropical Meteorological Project at Colorado State University predicted Wednesday.

In a forecast that perfectly mirrors earlier predictions issued on Dec. 6, 2005, and April 4 of this year, the team—now headed by Philip J. Klotzbach—predicts that nine of the named storms will grow into hurricanes. Of those, five will become intense hurricanes.

WASHINGTON—Treasury Secretary nominee Henry M. Paulson Jr. has supported continuation of the federal terrorism insurance backstop in the past, a position that runs somewhat counter to the administration in which he’ll serve if he is confirmed.

The Workers' Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau (WCIRB) released a report Wednesday that indicates that since enactment of the three workers' compensation reform bills -- AB 227 and SB 228 in 2003, and SB 899 in 2004 -- aggregate insurance reserves for comp have improved from an estimated $12.9 billion deficit to a $5 billion surplus.

The WCIRB estimated ultimate losses for all injuries at the end of 2005 to be $5 billion less than insurers' estimates. Average projected ultimate claims losses did increase from 2004 to 2005, however.

WASHINGTON—Employers would be among the front line troops under the Bush administration’s plan to defend against an influenza epidemic.

The plan, released Wednesday, builds on ideas broached late last year by the federal government. It calls upon employers to implement such steps as relying more heavily on telecommuting, limiting meetings and having employees stay at least three feet away from each other.