Why Republic Group Insurance Sucks v.2

10-20-09 update

Received a letter the other day from Republic stating that they have decided to not cancel my policy Not sure why but Kudos for them to nut up like that.

Synopsis:

They say never start a sentence with the word I so rather than “I own a..”, I started it with “They say never”.. which should be acceptable? Anyway I own a new high performance sports car and have already taken it to the race track (3) times for track day without incident. Track day is essentially non competitive, non timed, high performance driving events that are designed to allow you to learn about the capabilities of your car in a safe, controlled and highly supervised environment rather than on the Toll Road surrounded my soccer moms. It is not racing, there are no trophies at the end and nobody is being timed. So anyway I’m off to an event this weekend and asked my insurance Company “Republic Group” if my car was covered, big mistake! They said “we don’t know, but will get back to you”. Well they got back to me alright and told me “you would be covered for the event” but also said they “set the policy to non-renew due to increased exposure”. Let me repeat.. They told me “you would be covered for the event” but also said they “set the policy to non-renew due to increased exposure”. Maybe I didn’t mention this but I have (3) cars and own a home, all of which are insured through Republic Group.

This tells me several things about Republic Group and their policies.

1.
Like too many other Companies they only really care about making a buck. That’s fine however, happily taking my money year after year and then pulling the rug out from under me for being honest is just plain sucks. Read on for more on my point of view.

2.
They claim to offer “coverage to fit the needs of our customers” which could not be more untrue, at least for me.

3.
Customer retention is an alien concept as we’ve used them for at least (6) years with no auto claims. This seemed to never even occur to them and I was treated like crap throughout my discussions with them regarding this.

Aside from all that we are on auto debit with them so we have never been late on an insurance payment, have purchased additional coverage for home contents and have even recommended them to others. That ends today and the old adage “treat a customer right and they might tell a few people, treat them poorly and they will tell everyone” has been proven accurate yet again.

~

When I started this blog a week ago I caught myself being a critic and realized that it’s easy to criticize and difficult to offer sound suggestions. So I made a rule for myself to not complain about anything unless I offer up at least (3) suggestions for resolving the complaint, so here I go.

1. Be appreciative of your client base
This felt more like health insurance and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being processed according to a complex series of analytics which led them to arrive at their bullshit conclusion. Needless to say this left an awfully sour taste in my mouth. Not just for Republic Group but for insurance companies in general. I’ll write about health insurance soon enough but fear I’ll wear out my keyboard since they really are just an awful bunch of leeches. The notion that they can jettison me as a client because I asked a question about my coverage is stunning. That the car is covered but they still have chosen to fire me as a client is even more disturbing. I’ve done nothing wrong, my credit is perfect, income is good, marriage is very stable, no auto claims and have not been convicted of a speeding ticket, ever! So why the ejection? Maybe they fear that I might slide off the track and crash into a wall or another car. Or even worse that I might cause bodily injury and dismemberment to a fellow driver or myself? That’s a fair argument but how about offering up some options? Work for that money for a change I say. Now I’ve only done track events (4) times but even going well over 100mph I feel far safer than going 75mph on the Toll road surrounded by drunkards, texting teens and ultra aggressive truckers.

2. Use rational when making decisions (aka don’t be a chicken shit)
Who am I to tell them how to run their business? They appear successful and their CEO Parker Rush (see pic below) is probably a nice enough guy , but I look at him and wonder what he would say if sitting across from me right now. “Well Mr. Cunningham, you must understand that while we appreciate your patronage our primary responsibility lies with our shareholders, therefore we mitigate risk though careful statistical analysis and by crapping on clients when our stats tell us to”. Ok maybe not that last part but Parker Rush has no idea who I am and probably never will. Even if he did I’m just client X and I fully understand how that works. It’s not like we’re going to go grab a beer one day. But how someone with a name as cool as Parker Rush can allow a good, loyal client to get canceled just for calling to verify coverage is beyond me. Over the years I’ve paid them between $40-50k which is peanuts, but it’s still easy money. I’m what you would call “low hanging fruit”. If they could draw up a list of attributes for a dream client, my photograph would magically appear. I pay, pay, pay, pay, pay, never get tickets, call or make claims. What could be easier?

3. Offer solutions instead of dead ends
This is key to my argument but maybe I’m a simpleton. How about this as a response. “Mr. Cunningham, we see you are a loyal client and while we do not encourage these activities, they are covered. How about this, we can modify your coverage to make sure you have the coverage you need and so it makes sense for us as well? Because we want your business, but we also want you to be safe and fully covered regardless of which type of driving activities you participate in.” My reply might be, “hmm, sounds reasonable, tell me more” instead of feeling betrayed, lied too and disrespected. Perhaps I would choose to pay more money but I would still like them and would not be venting my frustrations in a public forum. Not in a million years will that happen because I suspect that Parker Rush will not only never see this, he might not care if he did.  Sure I could be wrong about him but those are my suspicions.

So there you have it. My insurance Company sucks and they’re giving me the shaft but hopefully anyone searching the web for auto insurance or home insurance might luckily stumble upon this article and reconsider. Lucky for them I’m not mean like this but I sure am angry and wish I had not given them a penny of my money.

Now off to the track!