International professional organization of psychiatrists and related medical specialists that renders services for people with mental disease, mental retardation, and substance-related disorders.
Insurance Encyclopedia
American Psychological Association (APA)
Professional organization for advancement of psychology as a science and profession and promotes health, education, and human welfare.
American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM)
National standards group that formed the ASTM Committee E31 on Health Care Informatics. It published general guidelines for development of standards for health care identifiers.
American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA)
National association of anesthesiologists that maintains and publishes guidelines for coding anesthesia services.
American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII)
Common computer coding system used for data communications that uses 128 numbers for a set of letters and characters, leaving 128 numbers as extras in an eight-bit byte. Programmers use the extra characters to create graphic characters, applicable to specific computers. The abbreviation is commonly pronounced “AS-key.”
American trust fund
A fund established in New York to hold all Lloyd’s dollar premiums, whether originating in the US or not, and from which dollar claims are met. The fund, managed for Lloyd’s underwriters by Citibank, makes Lloyd’s one of the largest customers of one of the world’s largest banks. Most of the fund is invested in US Treasury Bonds making Lloyd’s one of the largest private investors in the US government.
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
Federal law that provides disabled employees equal treatment regarding the “terms, conditions, and privileges” of employment including the right to a harassment-free work environment.
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Passed by Congress in 1990, this act requires that reasonable accommodation be made in public accommodations, including the workplace, for those with physical or mental disability.
Amortization (Pensions)
A systematic process of paying a debt, with interest, over a given number of years.
Amortization / Amortisation
Process of the gradual retirement of an outstanding debt by making periodic payments over a stated period of time.
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UK: Periodical reduction in the value of a lease or other time-related asset until the asset is written down to nil. In insurance it is the ability to match the cost of cover to the actuarial probability of risk over time. Pension scheme actuaries spread an actuarial surplus or actuarial deficiency over an appropriate period.
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Writing off part of the value of an asset in a company’s books at intervals until the value of an asset is extinguished.
Amortization schedule (Pensions)
A table detailing the schedule for paying off a debt over a given number of years.