Structured Settlements 4Real®Blog 2026

Structured settlements expert John Darer reviews the latest structured settlements and settlement planning information and news, and provides expert opinion and highly regarded commentary. that is spicy, Informative, irreverent and effective for over 20 years.

Patrick Hindert’s latest pedantic rant on Business Standards and Practices-2 attacks the NSSTA Certified Structured Settlement Consultant certification hosted at University of Notre Dame.

He states:

Advanced training” for those structured settlement broker/consultant/agents who are members of NSSTA (“America’s largest association of structured settlement professionals”) may include a one-time one weekend “certification” program (CSSC) at the University of Notre Dame plus continuing education credits at NSSTA-sponsored education conferences. “

While the structured settlement watchdog has himself rightfully roasted members of the structured settlement industry who have mischaracterized their CSSC credential, Hindert’s comments simply raise the question of Patrick Hindert’s own credibility.

  • The CSSC program has been ably run by Karen Meyers, a former associate of Hindert, for many years.
  • The curriculum for what Hindert describes as a “weekend course” requires approximately 40 hours of pre-reads, the bulk of which is from Structured Settlements and Periodic Payment Judgments by Patrick Hindert, Jules Dehner and Dan Hindert.
  • If Hindert doesn’t respect a course that is built substantially around his co-authored text then perhaps the course can be improved upon with another text or texts. For example there are texts by Paul Lesti ( published by Clark Boardman Callahan), and Matt Garretson/Kornblum ( published by Thomson West) which together, or in conjunction with others could present a meaningful improvement. Hindert has brought this to a head, where do we go from here?

The structured settlement watchdog puts the subject up for debate:

With all due respect if Hindet questions a course that uses his own text then perhaps NSSTA should consider not using Structured Settlements and Periodic Payment Judgments in its CSSC curriculum?

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