Wow, these people are utterly useless. I've come to terms with the fact that the "agent" is basically just an extension of the computer system, and pretty much only exists to answer the phone and tell you what you owe (which is an ever-increasing amount, even if you've never cost them a dime), but now they can't even do that.

I have four vehicle policies and a homeowners policy with State Farm. I've been with them for almost 20 years. I have the same coverage on all of them, and always pay in full every six months. Recently, I started getting email notices that some of my vehicles are now going to be lumped together under a new "multi-car" policy. But the emails only list two of the vehicles, don't specify if the others are going to be included, when the bill would be due, or what the total cost would be.

So I called my agent to see if she could tell me. She couldn't. The best info she could give me is that my bill would likely come sometime in October, but she couldn't tell me what vehicles would be included or how much it would be, or if I would continue to get bills for the other individual policies in the meantime.

I told her it's very difficult to know how to plan for that presumably large lump sum payment without that information. She understands .

Thanks for your assistance. It's very effing helpful.

Same here.

I've had auto insurance with SF for 49 years and homeowners for 35 years.

We have 3 vehicles and I told our agent I did NOT want a huge lump sum bill for all 3 at the same time. I told her I like the fact each vehicle is on a different billing cycle.

She understood, but, told me others had complained about getting multiple bills throughout the year.

I told her from her perspective, that was better than losing her clientele because they couldn't afford one huge bill.

Find an independent broker. We have an agency that shops around every year for the best policies. Most years that means swapping companies to get the best price. This year, we have one company for homeowners, one company for two of our vehicles, and a third company for our third vehicle. Sounds weird, but it was the only way we could get the coverage we wanted as our previous company wouldn't stopped offering some coverage and raised our rates.

quote:

Originally posted by 92fstech:

Wow, these people are utterly useless.

You wanna talk about a useless insurance agent? I'll tell you about one.

September 1, 2024, I dumped the Ford Escape that had been giving me nothing but grief, and replaced it with a Cadillac LYRIQ EV. I texted my agent (Travelers), giving her the VIN, etc., and told her to drop the Escape from the policy, replace it with the LYRIQ, same coverage. Did not ask her for a quote, just told her to DO IT!

Three weeks later, I received two items in the mail. One was a letter from the DMV, revoking my driving privileges because I was allegedly driving an uninsured vehicle. The other was from the agent's incompetent niece, who worked in the office, giving me a quote for the LYRIQ. A quote, although I had specifically told the agent, three weeks earlier, to go ahead and make the change without giving me a quote.

Pissed? You can't imagine. I got on the Travelers website to lodge a complaint, got involved with a chat rep, who told me that I could do virtually any change to the policy directly on the Travelers corporate website without going through an agent, and the chat rep walked me through the process and showed me where to find the links to the web pages that I needed. Also gave me a list of other Travelers agents in the area. Company good, agent bad.

quote:

Originally posted by Perception:
Find an independent broker. We have an agency that shops around every year for the best policies. Most years that means swapping companies to get the best price. This year, we have one company for homeowners, one company for two of our vehicles, and a third company for our third vehicle. Sounds weird, but it was the only way we could get the coverage we wanted as our previous company wouldn't stopped offering some coverage and raised our rates.

We use a Broker as well . He's able to answer a lot of questions but sometimes it's easier to just call the Insurance company for some things .

My Ex is a long time agent with the big insurers. She tells me that online buying of policies is eating into agents profits and she feels that brick and mortar insurance offices (and agents) may soon go the way of the Dodo.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
and she feels that brick and mortar insurance offices (and agents) may soon go the way of the Dodo.

At this point, there's no reason not to.

Carrier-specific brick and mortar agents have become purely salespeople. They cannot help with anything beyond selling you a new policy or making coverage changes to an existing one. And those you can do on the carrier's website yourself.

For literally anything else, they have to refer you to the carrier's national phone line. Questions about a claim? Can't help, call the carrier's claims center. Questions/problems with a bill? Can't help, call the carrier's billing center. Etc.

They're utterly redundant at this point. They could easily do away with carrier-specific agents, leaving purely fewer independent agents for wide-ranging price comparison across all carriers for new policies, with existing carrier-specific policy changes/questions/problems being handled via phone/website like they already are.

But that would put a ton of insurance agents and their employees out of work, so I'm sure there's a big lobbying effort against that.

Back in November 2019 I bought a new motorcycle and called my State Farm agent to add the new bike and cancel insurance on the old bike. I foolishly assumed the agent completed the switch but 30 days later I found out my old bike was still on my policy and they failed to add the new bike so I was riding for 30 days uninsured.

Agent assured me they would get the switch made and 30 days later I check again and again the old bike is still on my policy but they still haven't added the new bike. At that point I switched to Allstate, State Farm sent me a updated policy and the new bike was on there, the old bike was still on the policy the one that should have been deleted 2 months ago and they deleted my Kawasaki H2SXSE from my policy. Total idiot agent and I had been with State Farm for several years.

I feel your pain

Couple weeks ago my door blew open in a gust of wind while getting out of my car at work and banged into the (of course it was) brand new SUV next to me and left a nice dent and some paint.

I called my State Farm agent who I have been paying for 30 years now this year about how to handle it and all he could tell me was "call this number" or "use the app". Thanks

I'm SO close to ditching State Farm anyway as I think they are now raping me on my auto coverage and the broker I've been working with also told me they did something sneaky with my deductible on my homeowners too. He told me it was WAY higher than it was supposed to be something like 5-6% and thinks they did it to a bunch of people without any notification.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
My Ex is a long time agent with the big insurers. She tells me that online buying of policies is eating into agents profits and she feels that brick and mortar insurance offices (and agents) may soon go the way of the Dodo.

It's going to be inevitable.

Look at the travel industry from 30 years ago to now and how dramatically that has changed. The internet changes everything.

How many of you actually review your policy ? I learned that the hard way after the flood of 2016. Nobody reviews their Federal Flood Insurance , right ? One minute would have saved me thousands ..

quote:

Originally posted by RogueJSK:

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
and she feels that brick and mortar insurance offices (and agents) may soon go the way of the Dodo.

At this point, there's no reason not to.

Carrier-specific brick and mortar agents have become purely salespeople. They cannot help with anything beyond selling you a new policy or making coverage changes to an existing one. And those you can do on the carrier's website yourself.

For literally anything else, they have to refer you to the carrier's national phone line. Questions about a claim? Can't help, call the carrier's claims center. Questions/problems with a bill? Can't help, call the carrier's billing center. Etc.

They're utterly redundant at this point. They could easily do away with carrier-specific agents, leaving purely fewer independent agents for wide-ranging price comparison across all carriers for new policies, with existing carrier-specific policy changes/questions/problems being handled via phone/website like they already are.

But that would put a ton of insurance agents and their employees out of work, so I'm sure there's a big lobbying effort against that.

Not the case for me. My agent does everything for me. I do nothing but sit myself in the chair in their office and tell them the issue.

New roof is the most recent from storms. I talked to no person on a national hotline.
Simply told the agent I had damaged provided said proof and they did the rest along with the roofing company.

Then before that a collision. Walked into the officer answers the questions took my car to the body shop paid them my $100 deductible car was fixed.
State Farm got their money from the other party since it was not our fault got refunded my $100 deductible.
Never talked to a National hotline number.

Well, about 30 minutes after I posted this this morning, I got an email from state farm notifying me that my agent is retiring at the end of the month and my accounts are being migrated over to a new agent. He has the same address, so I assume he's just taking over her office. Never said a word to me about it when I was on the phone with them. Good riddanced. I can't imagine he'll be much better, but he can't be any more useless.

I tried the independent agent thing a year or so ago and he gave me three quotes, none of which significantly beat my current State Farm coverage. I'll give this new guy a try, and if he sucks I may give it another try with a different independent agent.

quote:

Originally posted by Perception:
Find an independent broker. We have an agency that shops around every year for the best policies. Most years that means swapping companies to get the best price. This year, we have one company for homeowners, one company for two of our vehicles, and a third company for our third vehicle. Sounds weird, but it was the only way we could get the coverage we wanted as our previous company wouldn't stopped offering some coverage and raised our rates.

Where do you find Insurance Brokers?

Thanks Matt

quote:

Originally posted by Black92LX:

Not the case for me...Never talked to a National hotline number.

Same here. I call my State Farm agent and its taken care of. Last year, my homeowner's premium increased by some 20%. Called my agent and she said she would look into it and call me back. Couldn't have been 10 minutes and she called and said that my policy has a provision that automatically adjusts the home replacement value at certain intervals, and it often overestimates. Once that was adjusted to a realistic amount, the increase was less than 3%. Guess there's diligent and lazy in every profession.

I feel your pain 92fstech. I've had State Farm for over 40 years and currently have two vehicles and the house insured with them. After being in an accident last December, not my fault and long story, I realized the State Farm of yesteryear is not the State Farm of today. They were a PIA dealing with the situation and thankfully the person who hit me finally admitted it was her fault, her insurance company (Geico) stepped in and paid the claim super quick.

And being in the collision industry I see the changes in the way State Farm has shifted their "business model" it's only getting worse.

And then there is the upcoming State Farm increases in home owner's ins........................

I was with State Farm for over 20 years until recently when they totally buggered up dealing with a wreck my wife was in last November. Took two months or more to get it straightened out, and after that I switched to Progressive.

SF was charging us a bit over $250.00/mo for all of our autos, and the exact same coverage with Progressive is $64.85/mo.

Just got my State Farm bill and they raised my vehicle coverage from $169.70 to $195.10 for two 10 year old cars.

The wife's car pretty much stays parked in the garage these days and used only for doctor visits.

I'll be checking rates with Progressive and Geico today

Left state farm years ago due to agents being buffoons. Prior to them going black in the commercials which made me glad I switched carriers.

Had erie for the past 20 years home and auto. Cheaper and no agent or claim issues.