From My Junk Mail File
Just got an auto insurance solicitation from Allstate. Immediately threw it out – know why?
Why would I want to get my insurance from the worst insurance company in America? How could I do business with a company that instructs its adjusters to lie to their customers?
Allstate’s confrontational attitude towards its own policyholders
was the brain child of consulting giant McKinsey
& Co. in the mid-1990s.McKinsey was tasked with developing
a way to boost Allstate’s bottom line.11 McKinsey
recommended Allstate focus on reducing the amount of
money it paid in claims, whether or not they were valid.
When it adopted these recommendations, Allstate made a
deliberate decision to start putting profits over policyholders.
The company essentially uses a combination of lowball
offers and hardball litigation.When policyholders file a
claim, they are often offered an unjustifiably low payment
for their injuries, generated by Allstate using secretive
claim-evaluation software called Colossus. Those that
accept the lowballed settlements are treated with “good
hands” but may be left with less money than they need to
cover medical bills and lost wages. Those that do not settle
frequently get the “boxing gloves”: an aggressive litigation
strategy that aims to deny the claim at any cost.
Former Allstate employees call it the “three Ds”: deny,
delay, and defend. One particular powerpoint slide
McKinsey prepared for Allstate featured an alligator and
the caption “sit and wait”—emphasizing that delaying
claims will increase the likelihood that the claimant gives
up.12 According to former Allstate agent Shannon Kmatz,
this would make claims “so expensive and so timeconsuming
that lawyers would start refusing to help
clients.”13
Former Allstate adjusters say they were rewarded for
keeping claims payments low, even if they had to deceive
their customers. Adjusters who tried to deny fire claims by
blaming arson were rewarded with portable fridges,
according to former Allstate adjuster Jo Ann Katzman.
“We were told to lie by our supervisors. It’s tough to look
at people and know you’re lying.”14
So I’ll answer Allstate via this blog post. No, I am not interested – not now, not ever.
Tags: Allstate, Corporate America, Insurance
I think health insurance companies do this too.
They definitely do. Thanks, X for this report. I hadn’t seen this and am sending this to everyone I know.
Interestingly, this report has 3 recommendations for reform of some of these issues. Any idea if any of these actions are implemented in Delaware or if there is any effort to get them implemented here?
From the same report, #2 was Unum:
With KWS at the wheel? Color me skeptical.
Wow, Allstate is on the shit-pile, too – actually, I knew that already, as my wife’s attorney told us they were one of the ‘Big Three’ screw-’em-if-they-try-to-get-their-coverage, the other two being State Farm and a certain piece of excrement that claims – heh, I said claim – to be on your side.
(some of you know this already, but for the benefit of the come-lately’s) One of those three (bet ya can’t guess who) played that same freaking game of wait and watch ’em fold and finally requested (and received by us, after we refused financially damaging low offers) a binding arbitration THREE years after the date of the claim. Being that we’re human, we had a daughter within those three years. Effing a-holes used our daughter to win a low-ball binding arbitration…just a year after a non-binding arbitration saw things to the tune of 100% higher.
The background on this claim was a **tch crossed a double-yellow and hit my wife head-on in a 50MPH zone, so both were at least that fast. Amazingly, neither died from the accident. Anyway, said **tch only had state minimum liability ($15k) which covered the first day of emergency response (which included a helicopter) and emergency room, etc. After that, our uninsured/UNDERinsured was to kick in. The agent on the line for “on-your-side” actually told me how’d they’d take care of all this for us, and would work in our interest, like an attorney. Yeah, advice from a CSR for the insurance company. Took me all of one day to get a solid referral and call an attorney. Well, on-your-side, probably as expected once being told we were represented, stopped any payment, pending legal outcome. The bills piled. Some of the providers, though, won’t accept a promise-to-pay (I forgot what the legal term is), so we had to pay them a boat load, before any of this was decided. Charge it! Unfortunately, I was too naive to realize how medical billers are very willing to work with you when times get tough, and this would have qualified. So, as I said, we charged those bills, to stay “on time.” Months and months went on, bills paid (charged) and other accumulated, pending legal outcome. Remember, this was a 50-MPH+ head-on collision.
By the time that non-binding arbitration happened, we had a couple-tens-of-thousands in bills, some paid (charged) and others pending. The non-binding arbitration also took into account future expenses, given the condition, as diagnosed by her doctor and their hired hack doctor, who happened to agree that my wife’s injuries were extensive and subject to a lifetime of rehab of varying degrees. So, the non-binding arbitration awarded her the max coverage of $50k, citing the existing and paid (charged) bills and future expenses. Of course, they appealed and subsequently offered $20k to cover existing and paid (charged) bills. Of that, as some of you know, 1/3rd would go to her attorney. So, eff you, on-your-side hack nuts.
One year later, three years after the accident, we learned, in binding arbitration, that our daughter, who was 1-1/4 at the time, was the reason for my wife’s life-long rehab (to varying degrees), not her accident.
Net settlement (via binding arbitration and taking out fees) didn’t even cover everything that was paid (charged) and pending.
Morale of the story, if you are in a tussle with your insurance company on accident-medical issues, don’t have children. That’s apparently a courtroom (or arbitration room) mechanism to ruin you.
Holy crap! How did that not go into moderation? 😛
Maybe I should have asked for guest-post status. Sorry about that. Kinda touched a nerve.
Smitty, had a similar incident with my wife (prior to our marriage. Although not as bad of an injury as your wife’s, we did settle for the $50,000 amount (I believe that is now the mandatory minimum), which certainly doesn’t cover the total future expenses. Since then I’ve popped up the underinsured coverage for us. We got a lawyer right away and didn’t pay for any of the medical bills, but dealing with the billing companies on the phone is enough to sue for damages 🙂
Bottom line…Most insurance companies suck 🙂
Well, we are with USAA now. I was not aware we qualified back then, but in this hellish aftermath, my father (my connection) got us set up with them. I know for a fact (via step-mom and a neighbor) that they do actually work well with claims. Of course, they come from a different mindset than that of the ilk of the excrement-three.
Yeah, good to you that you were able to settle for that $50k limit. Some people see that number, which is a big number, and wonder what the bitching is all about; but here you are, knowing what I know, that it doesn’t cover everything. So, on-your-side was able to get the first arbitration whacked and reduced by 50%-ish, all because our newborn daughter supposedly intensified/exaggerated my wife’s injuries. All those bulging disks from before she was even pregnant, yeah, my daughter’s fault. They got out of future expenses related to the accident on that defense.
Maybe the radical right can pick that up as a form of birth control.
My car insurer raised my rates on the basis of ‘information in my credit report’. So I got a copy of my report to see what adverse information was being reported.
The credit score was excellent and they admitted as such. But there were ‘problems’.
None of my accounts were over 10 years old. I went through a divorce and cancelled everything.
One of my accounts was near the credit limit. Half of the accounts of record were at 0 balance.
I opened one a couple of months before to get a 15% discount and there would be no interest if paid within a year. We purchased custom draperies and the price was a bit over the limit. I paid cash for the balance and paid off the balance in a few months.
There was also a matter of a business in the house. The previous owner did have an office there but I did not.
I complained and the rates went down the next time around.
I thought the credit check was only at the inception of the policy, which still reeks of bull shit. I was not aware they could reset rates on that. Was it recent, Art?
I was one ex-adjuster interviewed. If you have a large loss, hire your own adjuster to fight for you