ISO, Insurance Services Office Inc., has a Public Protection Classification service that gauges a local fire departments ability to respond to fires. They collect information regarding the responsiveness and effectiveness of local fire departments, analyze the data using their Fire Suppression Rating Schedule (FSRS) and then assigns a Public Protection Classification from 1 to 10. A rating of 1 means the best public protection while a rating of 10 means there’s no recognized protection whatsoever.
How does this information benefit you? The lower the rating, the lower the homeowners insurance premium for residents of that area since the severity of any fires should be mitigated, at least based on the protection class. ISO currently covers over 44,000 fire-response jurisdictions.
Residents of Dawsonville, GA recently discovered that their rating of six, down from 7-10, meant lower premiums for their residents.
The lowering of the PPC is effectively passed on to citizens in the form of savings on property insurance. According to Thurmond, “If you were a class nine or seven before this evaluation, you will save money on your property insurance.” Thurmond said this could mean an annual savings of $800 for a $250,000 home that was formerly rated class nine and will now be rated class six.