Mercury Insurance 2008 Annual Report Download - page 91

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Item 9A. Controls and Procedures
Evaluation of Disclosure Controls and Procedures
The Company maintains disclosure controls and procedures designed to ensure that information required to be disclosed
in the Company’ s reports filed under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, is recorded, processed, summarized and
reported within the time periods specified in the Securities and Exchange Commission rules and forms, and that such information
is accumulated and communicated to the Company’ s management, including its Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial
Officer, as appropriate, to allow for timely decisions regarding required disclosure. In designing and evaluating the disclosure
controls and procedures, management recognizes that any controls and procedures, no matter how well designed and operated, can
provide only reasonable assurance of achieving the desired control objectives, and management necessarily was required to apply
its judgment in evaluating the cost benefit relationship of possible controls and procedures.
As required by Securities and Exchange Commission Rule 13a-15(b), the Company carried out an evaluation, under the
supervision and with the participation of the Company’ s management, including the Company’ s Chief Executive Officer and the
Company’ s Chief Financial Officer, of the effectiveness of the design and operation of the Company’ s disclosure controls and
procedures as of the end of the period covered by this report. Based on the foregoing, the Company’ s Chief Executive Officer and
Chief Financial Officer concluded that the Company’ s disclosure controls and procedures were effective at the reasonable
assurance level.
Changes in Internal Control over Financial Reporting
There has been no change in the Company’ s internal control over financial reporting during the Company’ s most recent
fiscal quarter that has materially affected, or is reasonably likely to materially affect, the Company’ s internal control over financial
reporting. The Company’ s process for evaluating controls and procedures is continuous and encompasses constant improvement
of the design and effectiveness of established controls and procedures and the remediation of any deficiencies which may be
identified during this process.
Management’s Report on Internal Control over Financial Reporting
The management of the Company is responsible for establishing and maintaining adequate internal control over financial
reporting. The Company’ s internal control system was designed to provide reasonable assurance to the Company’ s management
and Board of Directors regarding the preparation and fair presentation of published financial statements.
All internal control systems, no matter how well designed, have inherent limitations. Therefore, even those systems
determined to be effective can provide only reasonable assurance with respect to financial statement preparation and presentation.
The Company’ s management assessed the effectiveness of the Company’ s internal control over financial reporting as of
December 31, 2008. In making this assessment, it used the criteria set forth by the Committee of Sponsoring Organizations of the
Treadway Commission (COSO) in Internal Control – Integrated Framework. Based upon its assessment, the Company’ s
management believes that, as of December 31, 2008, the Company’ s internal control over financial reporting is effective based on
these criteria.
The Company’ s independent auditors have issued an audit report on the effectiveness of the Company’ s internal control
over financial reporting. This report appears on page 51.
Item 9B. Other Information
None