Lawmakers completing a sweeping overhaul of financial regulations on Tuesday agreed to permanently increase to $250,000 Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) coverage for individual accounts, and to make it retroactive to Jan. 1, 2008, the Los Angeles Times reported.

Congress temporarily boosted the coverage from $100,000 per account during the financial crisis in October 2008 – three months after federal regulators seized IndyMac Bank, a Pasadena, Calif.-based savings and loan.

The increase, originally set to expire at the end of 2009 but later extended through 2013, would be made permanent as part of proposed financial regulatory reform legislation making its way through Congress. A joint conference committee is attempting to reconcile differences between separate bills approved by the House and Senate.

The final version of the legislation is expected to pass by July 4, and the decision Tuesday by House and Senate members of the committee essentially guarantees that the increase in the coverage from the industry-paid deposit insurance fund will become law.

Although there was broad agreement on the committee for the higher insurance limit, House Republicans strongly opposed making the increase retroactive. That move largely benefits account holders at IndyMac, which failed in July 2008 when the maximum government insurance coverage for individual accounts was $100,000. Approximately 8,700 former IndyMac account holders are expected to recover some of their lost money with the increase.

Lawmakers estimated the retroactivity would funnel about $170 million in deposit insurance to those account holders, with an additional $10 million to depositors at four small banks that also failed in 2008 before the limit was raised.

Rep. Scott Garrett (R-N.J.) said the higher limit would help only wealthy account holders.

“This retroactive reward puts a new spin on the ‘too big to fail’ problem,” Garrett said. “This committee would say there are some people in the country who are too rich to lose.”

Many former IndyMac customers have complained that the bank’s employees misled them about deposit insurance limits in setting up multiple accounts and trust accounts to increase insurance coverage.