Crawford TPA Solutions: Broadspire revenues are from the global casualty and disability insurance and self-insured markets in the U.S., U.K., Canada, and Europe and Rest of World. Revenues before reimbursements by major region, based on actual exchange rates and using a constant exchange rate were as follows:
There was a change in the U.K. contractor repair business operating model where we are now acting as an agent instead of principal in certain relationships with clients related to our Contractor Connection service line, which represents a $11.0 million reduction, or 3.1% negative variance in Crawford Specialty Solutions revenues in 2018 compared to 2017. This change had no impact to operating earnings.
Overall, there was as 26.9% increase in cases received in Crawford Claims Solutions in 2017 compared to 2016. This was primarily due to the WeGoLook acquisition, which accounted for a 27.4% increase in Crawford Claims Solutions cases. Absent the high-frequency, low-complexity cases form the WeGoLook acquisition, total cases received decreased by 0.5% in 2017 compared to the 2016 period. The increase in U.S. case volumes was due to the WeGoLook acquisition and an increase in weather related activity resulting from cases received from hurricanes in the 2017 period. The U.K. case volumes were lower in the 2017 period due primarily to flooding-related cases received in 2016. The increase in Canada was due to an increase in high-frequency, low-complexity case volumes from existing clients, partially offset by a reduction in weather-related case volumes from the Fort McMurray wildfires in 2016. The decrease in cases in Australia was due to a decline in high-frequency, low-complexity property cases that were present in the prior year. There was a decrease in cases received in Europe due to a decrease in high-frequency, low-complexity property cases. The decrease in cases in Rest of World were due to a decline in high-frequency, low-complexity property cases in Asia.
Reimbursements for out-of-pocket expenses incurred in our Crawford TPA Solutions: Broadspire segment which are included in total Company revenues increased to $9.6 million in 2017 from $9.0 million in 2016. This increase was due to the higher revenues, primarily in the U.S.
The decrease in revenues for 2017 compared with 2016 was primarily due to lower revenues in our Garden City Group service line, which represents a $36.1 million reduction, or 9.4% of Crawford Specialty Solutions revenue variance. This reduction was due to lower revenues from the Deepwater Horizon class action special project and a lower volume of case administration work on projects in the 2017 period. Revenues in the Crawford Specialty Solutions segment were also negatively impacted due to a change in the operating model in the U.K. contractor repair business where we are acting in an agency role instead of the contract principal in certain relationships with clients in our Contractor Connection service line, which represents a $16.0 million, or 4.2% revenue reduction, for 2017 compared to the prior year. This change had no impact to segment operating earnings.
Unallocated corporate and shared costs and credits were $9.3 million, $13.5 million, and $24.4 million in 2018, 2017, and 2016, respectively. The decrease in 2018 compared with 2017 was due to lower incentive compensation, payroll taxes and benefits, lower self-insured costs and defined benefit pension expenses, partially offset by an increase in unallocated professional fees. These costs decreased in 2017 compared with 2016 due primarily to a decrease in U.S. defined benefit plan expense, unallocated professional fees, and self-insured expenses.
Cash provided by investing activities increased by $88.3 million in 2018, from a use of $81.9 million in 2017 to $6.4 million provided in 2018. This increase was primarily due to the proceeds from the Garden City Group disposal of $42.6 million in 2018 and $36 million cash paid for the acquisition of WeGoLook in 2017. Both of these transactions are discussed in Note 3, "Acquisitions and Disposition of Business Line" included in Item 8 of this Annual Report on Form 10-K. Cash used to acquire property and equipment and capitalized software, including capitalization of costs for internally developed software, was $30.0 million in 2018 compared with $44.9 million in 2017. We forecast that our property and equipment additions in 2019, including capitalized software, will approximate $28 million due to investments required to fund initiatives in our three-year strategic plan.
Funding requirements are no longer as sensitive to changes in the expected rate of return on plan assets and the discount rate used to determine the present value of projected benefits payable under the U.S. Qualified plan. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 ("BBA2015") included pension funding reform which greatly reduced the contributions required to the U.S. Qualified Plan. In addition to BBA2015 legislation, pension funding has been governed by rules under the Pension Protection Act of 2006, as amended by the Worker, Retiree and Employer Recovery Act of 2008, the Preservation of Access to Care for Medicare Beneficiaries and Pension Relief Act of 2010, and the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act, and the Highway Transportation Funding Act of 2014. Volatility in the capital markets and future legislation may have a negative impact on our U.S., U.K. and other international pension plans, which may further increase the underfunded portion of our pension plans and our attendant funding obligations. Expected and required contributions to our underfunded defined benefit pension plans will reduce our liquidity, restrict available cash for our operating, financing, and investing needs and may materially adversely affect our financial condition and our ability to deploy capital to other opportunities.
We review the expected long-term rate of return on an annual basis and revise it as appropriate. To support our conclusions, we periodically commission asset/liability studies performed by third-party professional investment advisors and actuaries to assist us in our reviews. These studies project our estimated future pension payments and evaluate the efficiency of the allocation of our pension plan assets into various investment categories. These studies also generate probability-adjusted expected future returns on those assets. As a result of the transition to a liability-driven investment strategy described previously, the expected long-term rates of return on plan assets assumption used to determine 2019 net periodic pension cost were estimated to be 6.10% and 3.28% for the U.S. and U.K. plans, respectively.
Cumulative unrecognized actuarial losses for all plans were $280.9 million through December 31, 2018, compared with $268.5 million through December 31, 2017. These unrecognized losses reflect changes in the discount rates, differences between expected and actual asset returns, and changes to mortality expectations for plan participants, which are being amortized over future periods. These unrecognized losses may be recovered in future periods through actuarial gains. However, unless the minimum amount required to be amortized is below a corridor amount equal to 10.0% of the greater of the projected benefit obligation or the market-related value of plan assets, these unrecognized actuarial losses are required to be amortized and recognized in future periods. For example, projected pension plan expense for 2019 includes $10.9 million of amortization of these actuarial losses versus $10.7 million in 2018, $11.2 million in 2017 and $12.8 million in 2016.
In accordance with GAAP, we have considered the four possible sources of taxable income that may be available to realize a tax benefit for deductible temporary differences and carryforwards and have an $25.9 million valuation allowance on certain net operating loss and tax credit carryforwards in our international and domestic operations. For our remaining deferred tax assets, we believe that it is more likely than not that we will realize these assets based on our forecast of future taxable income and tax planning strategies that are available to the Company. Future changes in the valuation allowance, if required, should not affect our liquidity or our compliance with any existing debt covenants.
Our tax credit carryforwards primarily consist of $14.5 million of foreign tax credit ("FTC") carryforwards, which materially expire in 2020. Companies that cannot credit all the foreign taxes paid or deemed paid in a particular tax year because their foreign taxes exceed their FTC limitation are allowed to carry their excess taxes back to the preceding tax year and then forward to the ten succeeding years. Utilization of our FTCs is dependent upon sufficient U.S. regular taxable income and foreign source income in the relevant foreign tax credit basket which is impacted by the interaction of overall domestic and overall foreign loss rules. Based on our projections of income through 2020, including the estimated impact of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act in the U.S., we expect to fully utilize all but $7.0 million of the FTC carryforwards before expiration after consideration of the Tax Act and the four sources of taxable income. Accordingly, in the period ended December 31, 2018 we established a valuation allowance against $7.0 million of the FTCs, which was primarily related to the Tax Act.
In order to fully utilize these state NOL carryforwards, our domestic operations must generate taxable income prior to the expiration of the carryforwards. After consideration of the four sources of taxable income, the Company expects to fully utilize its state NOL carryforwards in the majority of jurisdictions before expiration. Accordingly, we concluded that it was more likely than not that the Company should be able to utilize its state NOL carryforwards for these jurisdictions. There are certain states with unique rules that result in the Company not expecting to utilize the state NOL carryforwards before expiration. For those jurisdictions, we concluded that it was not more likely than not that the Company should be able to utilize its state NOL carryforwards and a valuation allowance was recorded. The valuation allowance against state NOL carryforwards was $1.1 million as of December 31, 2018.
For operations outside the U.S. that prepare financial statements in currencies other than the U.S. dollar, results of operations and cash flows are translated into U.S. dollars at average exchange rates during the period, and assets and liabilities are translated at end-of-period exchange rates. The resulting translation adjustments, on a net basis, are included in "Other Comprehensive Income" in the Company's Consolidated Statements of Comprehensive Income, and the accumulated translation adjustment is reported as a component of "Accumulated other comprehensive loss" in the Company's Consolidated Balance Sheets.
In July 2017, the FASB issued ASU 2017-11, "Earnings Per Share (Topic 260); Distinguishing Liabilities from Equity (Topic 480); Derivatives and Hedging (Topic 815): (Part I) Accounting for Certain Financial Instruments with Down Round Features, (Part II) Replacement of the Indefinite Deferral for Mandatorily Redeemable Financial Instruments of Certain Nonpublic Entities and Certain Mandatorily Redeemable Noncontrolling Interests with a Scope Exception." The ASU Part I changes the classification analysis of certain equity-linked financial instruments with down round features and the related disclosures. Part II of the amendments recharacterizes the indefinite deferral of certain provisions of Topic 480 and do not have an accounting effect. The Company elected to early adopt this ASU for the period ended December 31, 2018, with no impact on its results of operations, financial condition and cash flows.
The Company adopted ASC 606 using the modified retrospective method for those contracts which were not substantially completed as of the transition date. The reported results for the year ended December 31, 2018, reflect the application of ASC 606 while the reported results for the year ended December 31, 2017, reflect the application of ASC 605.
The credit facility under the Amended and Restated Credit Agreement (as amended, the "Credit Facility") consists of a $450.0 million revolving credit facility, with a letter of credit subcommitment of $100.0 million. The Credit Facility contains sublimits of $185.0 million for borrowings by the UK Borrower, $75.0 million for borrowings by the Canadian Borrower, and $32.5 million for borrowings by the Australian Borrower. The Credit Facility matures, and all amounts outstanding thereunder, will be due and payable on November 23, 2022.
Borrowings under the Credit Facility may be made in U.S. dollars, Euros, the currencies of Canada, Japan, Australia or United Kingdom and, subject to the terms of the Credit Facility, other currencies. Borrowings under the Credit Facility bear interest, at the option of the applicable Borrower, based on the Base Rate (as defined below) or the London Interbank Offered Rate ("LIBOR"), in each case plus an applicable interest margin based on the Company's leverage ratio (as defined below), provided that borrowings in foreign currencies may bear interest based on LIBOR only. The interest margin for LIBOR loans ranges from 1.30% to 2.10% and for Base Rate loans ranges from 0.30% to 1.10%. Base Rate is defined as the highest of (i) the Federal Funds Rate, as published by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, plus 1/2 of 1%, (ii) the prime commercial lending rate of Wells Fargo and (iii) LIBOR for a one month interest period plus 1.0%.
The majority of the Company's defined benefit pension plans have projected benefit obligations in excess of the fair value of plan assets. For these plans, the projected benefit obligations and the fair value of plan assets were as follows as of December 31, 2018 and 2017:
The Company computes earnings per share of CRD-A and CRD-B using the two-class method, which allocates the undistributed earnings for each period to each class on a proportionate basis. The Company's Board of Directors has the right, but not the obligation, to declare higher dividends on CRD-A than on CRD-B, subject to certain limitations. In periods when the dividend is the same for CRD-A and CRD-B or when no dividends are declared or paid to either class, the two-class method generally will yield the same earnings per share for CRD-A and CRD-B. During 2018, 2017 and 2016, the Board of Directors declared a higher dividend on CRD-A than on CRD-B.
Segment operating earnings includes allocations of certain corporate and shared costs. If the Company changes its allocation methods or changes the types of costs that are allocated to its three operating segments, prior period amounts presented in the current period financial statements are adjusted to conform to the current allocation process.
The Company's reportable segments' total assets reconciled to consolidated total assets of the Company at December 31, 2018 and 2017 are presented in the following table:
We have audited the accompanying consolidated balance sheets of Crawford & Company (the Company) as of December 31, 2018 and 2017, the related consolidated statements of operations, comprehensive income, cash flows, and shareholders' investment for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2018, and the related notes (collectively referred to as the “consolidated financial statements”). In our opinion, the consolidated financial statements present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position of the Company at December 31, 2018 and 2017, and the results of its operations and its cash flows for each of the three years in the period ended December 31, 2018, in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles.