Progressive’s claims handling is one of the worst I have dealt with, so as a result I am moving all my clients with Progressive at renewal. I have no faith in their ability to handle a client’s claim with any satisfaction. They are spending millions on advertising and using the money they should be spending on claims to pay for it. If Progressive wants to increase it’s production, start by improving their claims services and paying the damages that are rightfully owed.
The true color of this company know as progressive also means they support the progressive movement and have signed on with the White house to boycott talk radio i.e. Glenn Beck, ORielly, Limbaugh, etc. All they want is a socialist form of Govermnemt…See Erick of Red State for details…
No E&O issues yet and so far have never had one. Don’t want to start by having my clients forced into litigation because Progressive won’t pay what they owe to resolve the claim and be done with it.
In fairness, in my area, Progressive offers competitive rates and excellent claims service, which is why I use them, Unifortunately it is their compensation package that is lower by one third from what other companies offer. Let’s not bring up profitsharing, hwich is another problem. By the way the company acknowledges that these are issues, that likely will not change in the future. Which lead me to my original statement that it will be difficult for this compmany to increase it share of IA business, unit it pays us what we are worth. I have even suggested to the company that they file for a rate increase with the increase commission and then let me sell it, which I could do.
I have found Progressive to be competitive in Iowa. They are easy to quote and issue. Our claims service has been good.
Progressive does compete with the Indep. Agents, which I don’t like. Their commission level needs to be increased.
But, we find them competitive and easy to use. They are way ahead on technology.
We are getting some “contingency”, because of the amount of business we do with them.
It would be good to get more clients that have gone online to look for insurance to our agency.
We terminated our contract 8 years ago. Haven’t missed them at all. Why would any agent continue to take a lower commission to help them continue to stab you in the back? Look at what the company stands for, how they treat clients and agents. It’s a no brainer.
Its situational application of the law, we pay for insurance and Corporate Crooks such as Glen Renwick get rich. Progressive utilizes some dumb caricature to sell worthless insurance policies. There is nothing funny about death and an insurance company such as Progressive that REFUSES to honor their policy. Progressive is nothing more than a Ponzi Scheme in which the Corporate Executives get rich and leave injured policy holders bogus insurance policies which are not worth the paper they are written on. See Youtube.com video “Progressive Insurance Has Treated Me as Roadkill”
I’m constantly amazed at the ignorance of the posts related to Progressive. Agents constantly focus on direct, when if they were smart, they’d focus on the captives which are their true competition and local, but no, they’ll continue to whine about, while State Farm and Allstate take their customers. They continue to focus on the mutuals. Are they doing this for the IA channel? Absolutely not! Nor can they afford to do this. So go right ahead and continue to give them business while 75% of shoppers start on the web and you have no shot at any of that business. That’s fine just keep re-writing your same customers with different carriers within your agency and keep blaming Progressive for that. If any agency took advantage of everything Progressive offered, they’d grow their business dramatically (like I have) and they’d be prepared for the future of the insurance industry. Please keep doing what you’re doing….I’ll be happy to take your business and all the other prospective new business from you! Have fun shrinking
I can not disagree with a thing you said, IA. I use Porgressive when and where I can. I still wish the compensation was better, but I do not expect that it will. My original point was and is that this is a BIG obstical for Progressive to grow their business with IA’s, which is what this article is all about.
What’s amazing is you buy into everything Progressive tells you. You would need to grow your book with Progressive to make any money at all with their commissions. They have poor claims service too. Please continue to be a Progressive agent. My books grows daily with all my other companies and I don’t have to worry about them selling direct or taking the business later when it cancels and they rewrite it direct. Why would you think agents can’t possibly compete with captive agents using the many other IA companies who do support their agents? I have company studies too and they don’t show 75% of people start their auto shopping on the internet. That is Progressive’s study which I am sure they didn’t twist at all to support their way of doing things. So I will say agents can be competitive with captives and not have to use Progressive to do it. They are not the only company using the internet to create sales and many agencies like ours have internet quoting websites. You should change your name from IA to to Progressive brainwashed.
Go to comscore.com and read their “online Auto Insurance Report” – April 2009 and they’ll tell you how many people start on the internet. They’ll also tell you most of those people prefer to buy from an IA. But, agents will continue to rip them (Progressive) for helping the channel,while they sit back and re-write their book. I’m sure your agency is growing commissions, because you’re moving your existing customers to a higher commission company or the company that’s going to pay you profit sharing this year. How about total customer growth?
I think agents can’t compete with captives, because they don’t compete. They pick the company they want to sell and offer that rate/company. Isn’t that being a captive? Have you ever asked a general consumer about the difference b/t a State Farm agent and an IA? 99.99% of them couldn’t tell you. Why? Because IA’s don’t sell their value proposition. They’re too worried about losing business to direct companies, instead of becoming efficient (using technology not CSR’s), marketing (not Yellow pages, but web-sites), and selling their value proposition.
I’m sure you continue to place business with Travelers and Hartford as well.
In our area Progressive is competitive and claim service excellent. We write TONS of NEW business but use PGR as a last resort because they also compete with us. How can you be happy with PGR when they also compete with you? If you’re aggressive, as your post indicates, I would suggest you connect with one of the many other agency companies that want new business.
I’m glad to see someone is trying to set the record straight about Progressive. My company is located in two states, TX and LA. In LA, we are the number 1 producer for Progressive, and couldn’t be happier with them. Yes, right now the compensation isn’t as good as my other companies, but its all a matter of making yourself worth Progressive’s time. If you build a very large book, Progressive will listen to you when you ask for higher commisions, due to the fact that you are producing with them. Put yourself in Progressive’s shoes. Lets say you have 15 agencies. Two are bringing in the polices (and have good loss ratios with you as well), are you really going to increase a non-producing producer’s commission just because they whine about it? Now if you have a producing producer, you are really going to be listening to them, because you don’t want to lose them.
And as for everyone that says its wrong for Progressive to sell directly to the insured as well as thru agents, I say “They are not the only company that does direct, and also sells thru agents” AIG/21/ or whatever name they are under this week sells directly to the insured as well as thru agents, same goes for Unitrin, Hartford, etc etc. Its not always cheaper to go directly thru the company directly. Progressive Direct and Progressive Drive are two completely different products with two completely different rating systems.
I would if they could come close to offering what Progressive can offer….Recognized Brand, Web-site help, online quoting/referrals, direct mail marketing, signage, web-site that allows me to do more with fewer people, online servicing for my customers, consistent pricing….I could go on, but there’s nobody that has the total package. The value I gain with all of these items pays for the lower commission. As an agency, you have to get comfortable with a different operating model and agents haven’t done this on the PL side. Trust me it more than works!
I would advise you to do your homework and not believe all of the hype Progressive puts out. Go to jobvent.com and read comments by Progressive agents talking about scamming the customers, alleged drug abuse at work, Progressive scamming their own agents, shoddy repair work, etc., etc. Also do a general search of Progressive and you will find a lot of sites such as My3Cents.com where customers are desperately seeking help for the alleged fraud and scam job Progressive has perpetuated against them. See my site http://www.ProgressiveClaimsHelp.com for some information I have gathered from secondary sources and of course my youtube video “Progressive Insurance Has Treated Me as Roadkill”. Check out all of the stock maneuvers the “big boy” Glen Renwick has instigated to protect himself and his “personnal wealth”. Then think if you want to be associated with this type of Corporation and what will happen to YOU as an agent when the “consumers” start to sue you for your alleged part in Progressive’s scams against them. If you are going to sell a product/service to anyone one of the first mandates is that you HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE SELLING! Its your career and your future, at a minimum everyone should know what they are getting themselves into — whats the saying “if it looks too good to be true?”
I don’t get it. Why do you think every agent is just remarketing their own in house clients only? Of course you remarket in house clients as it is part of the job to retain your client base. We get a large amount of new business from referrals and internet shoppers and well as the old fashioned yellow pages. Plenty of new business as well as retention. We place auto with the best priced company for that client. I have twelve auto carriers to choose from including Progressive. Over 20 years in this business and the company I see the most complaints about is Progressive due to claims. Add into that they have taken policies that lapsed and replaced them in house directly instead of sending them back to the agent to rewrite. Also, every penny you send them helps pay for that direct business which competes against your agency. I will leave it that we each have vastly different opinions about this company. While many agents probably don’t maximize what makes them different than captives I can say we do and I have seen other agencies that do also. We IAs’ can offer pricing from many different companies with different coverage options as well as offer more lines of insurance than your standard captive agent. We don’t just shuffle the same clients around over and over. Growth is key but retention is what gets you those referrals. I just don’t believe in Progressive’s way of doing things. From what I read you seem to be captive to Progressive which to me limits your ability to meet all of your clients needs. I do appreciate the discussion though.
First you hit us in the face with Amazing Ignorance and then try education by telling us to read a customer satisfaction article that only addresses customer buying methods. You should be telling your clients that having a Progressive policy is amazing ignorance! One fact you cannot deny is actual first hand experience. If a company is not willing to pay what they owe on a claim to resolve it and you compare the same situation with how other insurance companies handle the same type of claim, it’s not ignorance to see that one company (Progressive) is looking for ways to not pay (so they can spend more on advertising)when others have resolve them fairly. My priority is making sure my customer is taken care of in the event of a loss and if costs them more premium to be with a company that manages claims fairly and helps them avoid dealing with one that does not and the agrevation and problems they could cause them, that’s where I will move them. Progressive is another 21st Century when it comes to claims management. The old saying you “get what you paid for” applies with these two.
Progressive doesn’t fit every niche and that’s okay. Progressive doesn’t pay the most commission, doesn’t want to and never will. Their stategy is pretty simple: The commission they DON’T pay you is used by them to develop better technology, e-signature capability,24×7 setvice, recognized brand,etc. If that’s not important to you then don’t use them. But you better bet that these things ARE important to your customers. You’re blind if you say differently. Yes I know your customers love you because of your relationship, blah, blah, blah. But customers want the relationship with the today’s technology attached. Other carriers know they’re behind in these areas and that keeps them from dropping commissions. They would if they could and it kills them that Progressive can get away with it. It’s no accident that the most backward company (technologically) in my office pays the most commission. Right or wrong Progessive has tried to set a commission/expense structure that both the agent AND consumer can see the benefits of.
I wouldn’t disagree that Glenn Renwick has been asleep at the wheel. How could he let Geico take away the 3rd position in PPA away from Progressive when Progressive had over 30,000 agents selling their product AND a Direct channel. He should be fired for this goof-up alone.
If Progressive wants to increase it’s business with independent insurance agents, then they need to pay a competitive commission rate.
Even better yet. They need to stop competing with their own agency network. Going direct is less expensive.
I agree with both prior comments…
also, their rates should be more competitive… we have smaller mutual companies that are killing them price-wise.
Progressive’s claims handling is one of the worst I have dealt with, so as a result I am moving all my clients with Progressive at renewal. I have no faith in their ability to handle a client’s claim with any satisfaction. They are spending millions on advertising and using the money they should be spending on claims to pay for it. If Progressive wants to increase it’s production, start by improving their claims services and paying the damages that are rightfully owed.
The true color of this company know as progressive also means they support the progressive movement and have signed on with the White house to boycott talk radio i.e. Glenn Beck, ORielly, Limbaugh, etc. All they want is a socialist form of Govermnemt…See Erick of Red State for details…
Hey Start by paying damages owed, were you involved in an E&O issue with Progressive?
No E&O issues yet and so far have never had one. Don’t want to start by having my clients forced into litigation because Progressive won’t pay what they owe to resolve the claim and be done with it.
In fairness, in my area, Progressive offers competitive rates and excellent claims service, which is why I use them, Unifortunately it is their compensation package that is lower by one third from what other companies offer. Let’s not bring up profitsharing, hwich is another problem. By the way the company acknowledges that these are issues, that likely will not change in the future. Which lead me to my original statement that it will be difficult for this compmany to increase it share of IA business, unit it pays us what we are worth. I have even suggested to the company that they file for a rate increase with the increase commission and then let me sell it, which I could do.
I have found Progressive to be competitive in Iowa. They are easy to quote and issue. Our claims service has been good.
Progressive does compete with the Indep. Agents, which I don’t like. Their commission level needs to be increased.
But, we find them competitive and easy to use. They are way ahead on technology.
We are getting some “contingency”, because of the amount of business we do with them.
It would be good to get more clients that have gone online to look for insurance to our agency.
We terminated our contract 8 years ago. Haven’t missed them at all. Why would any agent continue to take a lower commission to help them continue to stab you in the back? Look at what the company stands for, how they treat clients and agents. It’s a no brainer.
Its situational application of the law, we pay for insurance and Corporate Crooks such as Glen Renwick get rich. Progressive utilizes some dumb caricature to sell worthless insurance policies. There is nothing funny about death and an insurance company such as Progressive that REFUSES to honor their policy. Progressive is nothing more than a Ponzi Scheme in which the Corporate Executives get rich and leave injured policy holders bogus insurance policies which are not worth the paper they are written on. See Youtube.com video “Progressive Insurance Has Treated Me as Roadkill”
I’m constantly amazed at the ignorance of the posts related to Progressive. Agents constantly focus on direct, when if they were smart, they’d focus on the captives which are their true competition and local, but no, they’ll continue to whine about, while State Farm and Allstate take their customers. They continue to focus on the mutuals. Are they doing this for the IA channel? Absolutely not! Nor can they afford to do this. So go right ahead and continue to give them business while 75% of shoppers start on the web and you have no shot at any of that business. That’s fine just keep re-writing your same customers with different carriers within your agency and keep blaming Progressive for that. If any agency took advantage of everything Progressive offered, they’d grow their business dramatically (like I have) and they’d be prepared for the future of the insurance industry. Please keep doing what you’re doing….I’ll be happy to take your business and all the other prospective new business from you! Have fun shrinking
I can not disagree with a thing you said, IA. I use Porgressive when and where I can. I still wish the compensation was better, but I do not expect that it will. My original point was and is that this is a BIG obstical for Progressive to grow their business with IA’s, which is what this article is all about.
What’s amazing is you buy into everything Progressive tells you. You would need to grow your book with Progressive to make any money at all with their commissions. They have poor claims service too. Please continue to be a Progressive agent. My books grows daily with all my other companies and I don’t have to worry about them selling direct or taking the business later when it cancels and they rewrite it direct. Why would you think agents can’t possibly compete with captive agents using the many other IA companies who do support their agents? I have company studies too and they don’t show 75% of people start their auto shopping on the internet. That is Progressive’s study which I am sure they didn’t twist at all to support their way of doing things. So I will say agents can be competitive with captives and not have to use Progressive to do it. They are not the only company using the internet to create sales and many agencies like ours have internet quoting websites. You should change your name from IA to to Progressive brainwashed.
Go to comscore.com and read their “online Auto Insurance Report” – April 2009 and they’ll tell you how many people start on the internet. They’ll also tell you most of those people prefer to buy from an IA. But, agents will continue to rip them (Progressive) for helping the channel,while they sit back and re-write their book. I’m sure your agency is growing commissions, because you’re moving your existing customers to a higher commission company or the company that’s going to pay you profit sharing this year. How about total customer growth?
I think agents can’t compete with captives, because they don’t compete. They pick the company they want to sell and offer that rate/company. Isn’t that being a captive? Have you ever asked a general consumer about the difference b/t a State Farm agent and an IA? 99.99% of them couldn’t tell you. Why? Because IA’s don’t sell their value proposition. They’re too worried about losing business to direct companies, instead of becoming efficient (using technology not CSR’s), marketing (not Yellow pages, but web-sites), and selling their value proposition.
I’m sure you continue to place business with Travelers and Hartford as well.
In our area Progressive is competitive and claim service excellent. We write TONS of NEW business but use PGR as a last resort because they also compete with us. How can you be happy with PGR when they also compete with you? If you’re aggressive, as your post indicates, I would suggest you connect with one of the many other agency companies that want new business.
I’m glad to see someone is trying to set the record straight about Progressive. My company is located in two states, TX and LA. In LA, we are the number 1 producer for Progressive, and couldn’t be happier with them. Yes, right now the compensation isn’t as good as my other companies, but its all a matter of making yourself worth Progressive’s time. If you build a very large book, Progressive will listen to you when you ask for higher commisions, due to the fact that you are producing with them. Put yourself in Progressive’s shoes. Lets say you have 15 agencies. Two are bringing in the polices (and have good loss ratios with you as well), are you really going to increase a non-producing producer’s commission just because they whine about it? Now if you have a producing producer, you are really going to be listening to them, because you don’t want to lose them.
And as for everyone that says its wrong for Progressive to sell directly to the insured as well as thru agents, I say “They are not the only company that does direct, and also sells thru agents” AIG/21/ or whatever name they are under this week sells directly to the insured as well as thru agents, same goes for Unitrin, Hartford, etc etc. Its not always cheaper to go directly thru the company directly. Progressive Direct and Progressive Drive are two completely different products with two completely different rating systems.
I would if they could come close to offering what Progressive can offer….Recognized Brand, Web-site help, online quoting/referrals, direct mail marketing, signage, web-site that allows me to do more with fewer people, online servicing for my customers, consistent pricing….I could go on, but there’s nobody that has the total package. The value I gain with all of these items pays for the lower commission. As an agency, you have to get comfortable with a different operating model and agents haven’t done this on the PL side. Trust me it more than works!
I encourage you all to read the article on customer satisfaction. Progressive’s move on the agent Web-sites is supported by this article.
I would advise you to do your homework and not believe all of the hype Progressive puts out. Go to jobvent.com and read comments by Progressive agents talking about scamming the customers, alleged drug abuse at work, Progressive scamming their own agents, shoddy repair work, etc., etc. Also do a general search of Progressive and you will find a lot of sites such as My3Cents.com where customers are desperately seeking help for the alleged fraud and scam job Progressive has perpetuated against them. See my site http://www.ProgressiveClaimsHelp.com for some information I have gathered from secondary sources and of course my youtube video “Progressive Insurance Has Treated Me as Roadkill”. Check out all of the stock maneuvers the “big boy” Glen Renwick has instigated to protect himself and his “personnal wealth”. Then think if you want to be associated with this type of Corporation and what will happen to YOU as an agent when the “consumers” start to sue you for your alleged part in Progressive’s scams against them. If you are going to sell a product/service to anyone one of the first mandates is that you HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE SELLING! Its your career and your future, at a minimum everyone should know what they are getting themselves into — whats the saying “if it looks too good to be true?”
I don’t get it. Why do you think every agent is just remarketing their own in house clients only? Of course you remarket in house clients as it is part of the job to retain your client base. We get a large amount of new business from referrals and internet shoppers and well as the old fashioned yellow pages. Plenty of new business as well as retention. We place auto with the best priced company for that client. I have twelve auto carriers to choose from including Progressive. Over 20 years in this business and the company I see the most complaints about is Progressive due to claims. Add into that they have taken policies that lapsed and replaced them in house directly instead of sending them back to the agent to rewrite. Also, every penny you send them helps pay for that direct business which competes against your agency. I will leave it that we each have vastly different opinions about this company. While many agents probably don’t maximize what makes them different than captives I can say we do and I have seen other agencies that do also. We IAs’ can offer pricing from many different companies with different coverage options as well as offer more lines of insurance than your standard captive agent. We don’t just shuffle the same clients around over and over. Growth is key but retention is what gets you those referrals. I just don’t believe in Progressive’s way of doing things. From what I read you seem to be captive to Progressive which to me limits your ability to meet all of your clients needs. I do appreciate the discussion though.
First you hit us in the face with Amazing Ignorance and then try education by telling us to read a customer satisfaction article that only addresses customer buying methods. You should be telling your clients that having a Progressive policy is amazing ignorance! One fact you cannot deny is actual first hand experience. If a company is not willing to pay what they owe on a claim to resolve it and you compare the same situation with how other insurance companies handle the same type of claim, it’s not ignorance to see that one company (Progressive) is looking for ways to not pay (so they can spend more on advertising)when others have resolve them fairly. My priority is making sure my customer is taken care of in the event of a loss and if costs them more premium to be with a company that manages claims fairly and helps them avoid dealing with one that does not and the agrevation and problems they could cause them, that’s where I will move them. Progressive is another 21st Century when it comes to claims management. The old saying you “get what you paid for” applies with these two.
Progressive doesn’t fit every niche and that’s okay. Progressive doesn’t pay the most commission, doesn’t want to and never will. Their stategy is pretty simple: The commission they DON’T pay you is used by them to develop better technology, e-signature capability,24×7 setvice, recognized brand,etc. If that’s not important to you then don’t use them. But you better bet that these things ARE important to your customers. You’re blind if you say differently. Yes I know your customers love you because of your relationship, blah, blah, blah. But customers want the relationship with the today’s technology attached. Other carriers know they’re behind in these areas and that keeps them from dropping commissions. They would if they could and it kills them that Progressive can get away with it. It’s no accident that the most backward company (technologically) in my office pays the most commission. Right or wrong Progessive has tried to set a commission/expense structure that both the agent AND consumer can see the benefits of.
I wouldn’t disagree that Glenn Renwick has been asleep at the wheel. How could he let Geico take away the 3rd position in PPA away from Progressive when Progressive had over 30,000 agents selling their product AND a Direct channel. He should be fired for this goof-up alone.