Watch out for Progressive Insurance

[ManwithNoName]

.....Now their making all of their customers go to their drps shops for estimates this means you can still have your shop of choice repair the car but it has to be fixed by Progessives drp's estimate. So what this means is your getting screwed and by the way it's illegal and I'm not sure how they can get away with it but they are......it's you right to have you shop of choice fix the car to their standards not Progressive's.

I just had to jump in here because I happen to be an auto damage appraiser for one of them EVIL INSURANCE COMPANIES (and no it's not Progressive or any of the other companies mentioned so far in this thread). I'm not going to defend Progressive but I feel your OP may have been a little misleading. I very much doubt that Progrssives DRP Program is in anyway illegal. Insurance codes vary from State to State but I'm am sure & are there to protect the customer. Most of the insurance companies I know (I can't say for sure about Progressive because I don't write for them) & body shops write to I-CAR standards (which is the accepted standard in the collision industry). Was there something in this estimate that was below standard? How is the customer getting screwed? I'm not taking sides here but I'm not rally sure what got you all upset in the first place?

[Morgan]

Speaking from someone who does this for a living there will always be claims that go well and others that don't. Using a good agent is your best defense. As far as the best coverage for your collector car goes I have chosen to represent Hagerty, Grundy & American Collectors for standalone collector coverage and have had excellent claims experience with both Hagerty & Grundy (no claims with American Collectors yet). For insurance on your regular use cars the best there is from both a client and a body shop standpoint would be Chartis as they offer only OEM parts and Agreed Value on physical damage. The downside is that you have to be fairly affluent to qualify for Chartis as they don't do things on a standalone basis and to qualify you need either a house with at least a $1MM insurable value or spend at least $10k on all of your insurance per year. I offer an exclusive program through Chartis for affluent collectors where we schedule the physical damage for collectible or race cars on an Inland Marine form providing up to 150% Agreed Value, no deductible and worldwide coverage including transportation.

We are all lucky that there are great companies like Hagerty, Grundy & American Collectors who provide us with good service and good pricing on our toys but when it comes to the everyday cars I guess the old saying is true - you get what you pay for.

[ckessel]

I know from managing a body shop here in Cali that the insurance companies cannot by law dictate where you take your car for repairs. If they try, thats called "steering" which is a no-no. If you are dealing with a carrier that you have no contract with, do not release the car to the customer until you have recieved payment from the carrier and make sure that the carrier and customer are aware of this. Also while thay are waffling on payment, charge them storage per day and make sure they know that too. Progressive is one of the companies that blows along with the smaller ones. Even the big companies have issues too. You may even have to get tough on your contract companies too and charge them for storing and don't release the car until they get their feces together.

[tellyv]

I just had to jump in here because I happen to be an auto damage appraiser for one of them EVIL INSURANCE COMPANIES (and no it's not Progressive or any of the other companies mentioned so far in this thread). I'm not going to defend Progressive but I feel your OP may have been a little misleading. I very much doubt that Progrssives DRP Program is in anyway illegal. Insurance codes vary from State to State but I'm am sure & are there to protect the customer. Most of the insurance companies I know (I can't say for sure about Progressive because I don't write for them) & body shops write to I-CAR standards (which is the accepted standard in the collision industry). Was there something in this estimate that was below standard? How is the customer getting screwed? I'm not taking sides here but I'm not rally sure what got you all upset in the first place?

There getting screwed first off by getting told where they have to get their estimate, which is steering and illegal no matter how you word it period!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The reason I'm upset is that you have the right to take your car anywhere you want for the estimate or work, by telling my customer they have to go to someone else's shop for and estimate is absolute b.s. and should not be tolerated. And you and me both know what your bottom line is to spend the least amount of money that you possibly can and if you have a deal with a drp they will be more entitled to help you out and not try to push so they wont piss anyone off. Like I said before not all drp's do shady work or buckle to the b.s. of the insurance companies but I've fixed more cars than I can count on my two hands that were fixed half ass from a drp shop and guess what the insurance company did not stand behind their customer they stood behind their drp.

[tellyv]

Heres a drp story I might as well tell you guys, a friend of mine was steered by their agent to go to a drp shop, it was a brand new ranger it might have had 5k miles on it she put the truck in the ditch tore the right front wheel off of the truck it had no paint damage what so ever she picked the truck up and had all kinds of problems, it pulled really bad to the right, the heater made a horrible racket and did'nt work she brought the truck back and they told her it was fixed properly and that was it, she called here insurance company and they stood by the shop and said if the shop said it was fixed right it was period. She came by me balling so I looked the truck over and the frame was diamond so bad the box stuck out one side more than 2'', the wheel came up and smashed the heater box in and the fan relay was laying out in the open. Long story short she got stuck with the truck ended up selling it for nothing. One more quick one you'll like this, an ex nun went all over the world helping people took her car to the local drp when a tree branch fell on here trunk, she came out by me and the paint was bubbling off the trunk maybe 2 months after the repair, she told me it was just fixed by that shop and he doesnt warranty rust what!!!!! She gave me the original estimate and they were supposed to put a new trunk lid on it well guess what they filled it full of bondo and thats what was bubbling they did'nt even take the time to ruff up the repair area so she got screwed 2x's and another insurance company that stood behind the shop. Drp's get more from the insurance companies cuz they give more to them.

[ArtosDracon]

I had Progressive for years with no problems then I had my passenger window smashed in, my wallet stolen with cash in it along with my cell phone and my iPod. They refused to cover the cell phone, iPod or cash because I had no proof they were in the car at the time of the break in and when they replaced my window they refused to pay for tint, even though the car had the tint from the factory, it was not an aftermarket upgrade as they claimed. I even had the window sticker from the dealership showing factory installed tint.

About three months later I took it to a Progressive DRP, was supposed to get a new hood, new front bumper cover and new bumper, both headlights and the core support either tweaked straight or replaced. I got a new bumper cover, no bumper(bent original bumper just left with broken foam still in place) the hood was bondo'd and painted, got one new headlight and they left one cracked one and they didn't touch the core support. The paint bubled and pealed off the bumper cover, the hood wouldn't shut properly because of the bend and the bondo and my passenger headlight was cracked and pointed crooked(was never touched) so I refused to sign it out of the repair center, called in and got nowhere. They refused to continue to cover my rental car because my car was "done" so I had no choice but to take their ****ty work and get it fixed out of pocket somewhere else.

I dropped them ASAP. I now have geico and the service has been flawless so far.

[Jamess113]

I don't post over here much but Telly's thread about closing up shop due to steering and DRP's bothers me. I'm a small shop and I feel for what Telly is going though. I don't like seeing small shops like that just want to do a good job for there customer's and get paid to do it go out of business. So I thought I would post some of my thoughts and opinions I had posted over on Lateral-g over here.

Progresive's concierge service is just "Steering" in the biggest form. We as an industry brought all this difficulty upon are self's for the last 30 year. Unless we can change as an industry nothing will ever change. The only people that has the legal right to negotiate any claim is the police holder or the the owner of the vehicle, Period!. Body shops and the insurer do not have any legal right to negotiate a claim. ONLY the vehicle owner, police holder or a registered member of the bar "lawyer or Judge" has that right. The insurers ONLY job is to sell polices and pay claims and that all. That dose not include writing GUESSTIMATES. Until shops stick together as an industry noting will ever change. .

Maybe someone can explain why in a dealership situation the mechanical side of the shop can be any where from $85.00 to $120.00 per hour but when you go 200 feet in the same dealers body shop, they can work for $42.00 per hour. Is the over head different in that part of the building? What’s the difference; it’s the insurers interfering in our industry. Not to take anything away from mechanics but who has more artistic ability? Collision repairers and refinisher's have an unbelievable amount of artistic ability with no diagnostic tools, so shouldn'twe be paid on a equal level as mechanics? The reason we don’t get paid is the mechanical industry doesn't’t have a third party interfere with their business. Again in my opinion, DRP’s hurt the industry as a whole but the little guy gets hurt most because of steering. About 90% of all vehicle owners are “steered” because of the insurer word tracks. Statements like “we work well with XXX but if you go to that shop you are on your own” or” they over charge” and “they charge to much” or “they are not on our list”.

To be on a DRP you have to also give concessions like, not charging storage or eating the tow bill, not charging for hazardous waste or wet sand and buff or even labor rate concessions. Lets me ask you this, if a client who has no insurance or has a company that is willing to pay for storage or towing or wet sand and hazardous waste do you give it to them free like you partner insure? Why wouldn't’t you charge everyone the same? Would it not be discrimination not to? To make up for these items (if you do them at all) where does that money come from? The only way I know of is to use the LCS method. For these reasons a good portion of DRP work is not as good as it should be. We all know there are hacks on both sides of the street but in all of our “post repair inspections” the hackers are the DRP’s”.

I have always been a guy who knows my customer, the vehicle owner and no one else. I also have concerns about other aspects of our industry as well. How about the data suppliers? I for one have been critical of these suppliers. Lets think about a couple things, first I am sure you all have heard or know that most data supplies will not allow us the collision industry have an update until it is approved by the insurance industry most likely Snake Farm. What do this tell you. They control the data we use. This is easy to figure out because if you look at the data we had in 2000, the majority of which had higher labor times. Now, most time are shrinking. Take just about any individual item and compare it to ten years ago and you will find time allotted time lower. Take a 1999 Chevrolet pickup real bumper. In 1999 the overhaul time was 2.5 hours, today it is 1.8. Did we become faster, is there a special tool I don't know about that does the work for you? I think as time goes on everything actually gets harder. The should actually get higher as the job becomes harder when clips and bolts get rusted and dirt, grime and grease become prevalent. Have you ever asked for a time study on anything, we have and they don't have any. The times are what they put and you are expected to accept them. We don't, we bill in dollars and they always pay...period.

How about vehicles insurances premiums? You all know the insurance policy is an actual cash value policy. That means the insurer is only obligated to pay the up the value of the vehicle insured. So tell me, why do our policies continue to increase as the car losses value. So then how about diminished value? If the policy is an actual cash value policy, how do you take value away from that policy? If your car is worth $ 30,000.00 prior to the collision and you have $ 15,000.00 worth of damage, is your car still worth $ 30,000.00? Would you pay $ 30,000.00 for a damaged vehicle even if it were fixed correctly? I wouldn't, that means there is diminished value but the insurers try to get out of paying for this added loss, your loss. After many years of saying there is no such thing as DV they are now beginning to exclude it from your policy. So, how do you take cash value out of an actual cash value policy, just do it because you know people are stupid.

[MonzaRacer]

Oh add NAtionwide to the pile with Progressive.
As for insurance Progressive was paying for me to fix a car at Pep Boys, yet wanted me to leave in bent parts, so I called MAP certification people, and Indiana Attorney General and Pep Boys attorney,,,,guess what, before other lawyers got into it Indiana AG told them to get the check book out
I was on 3rd line to them and the fella from IAG office basically told them they had approved original repair THEN came back and tried to get us to leave an obviously bent control arm on car. Heck the IAG even asked me if I thought it should go to frame shop, but our new alignment machine told me what ai needed to know to actually feel confident about repair.
2 days later customer had car back with $1200 lower control arm (dont ask some idiotic AUDI garbage car,,real pain to fix).
See I dont understand the insurance companies, they would make billions more by fixing it right and NOT cutting corners. Having the shops cut corners eventually cost them billions as they lose customers.
Many moons ago I used to do all the work in smaller local town and ice damage ie slipping off road was big cash for me, and the insurance guys sent me thousands in work there. I would talk to customer, get approval on plan of attack with either new or salvage yard parts, cause heck some parts were like weeks or months out if ordered new. Dont get me wrong wear items always got new parts if at all possible.
But I would agree that in out Pro Touring world we should have an insurance rating to allow members to chose great insurance companies AND hopefully get us better rates.
Only issue I have ever had with Geico has been my motorcycle is outrageous, Im gonna go with Markel on that !

[censo69]

Right On Jay ! My father has been in the business for over 40 years and what the insurance companies do is ridiculous. Recently my mother was backed into and when my dad called to make the claim he got a good laugh when the girl on the phone 100% tried to steer him to using a specific shop. Now its not her fault she makes at most 10 bucks an hour ... she does whats shes told. Unfortunately the best a good shop can hope for is an educated policy holder. Now I would surmise that most of us on this board are pretty well educated as far as understanding the quality of repair. Best advice is know that YOU should decide the repair facility, ask friends and family members who they have used. If you think that the shop offering to pay your deductible for you is going to provide the best quality ...well good luck. The best action a shop can do is look into joining an association coming to together as a single entity with a strong presence is the only hope you have in trying to make a change.

[ManwithNoName]

There getting screwed first off by getting told where they have to get their estimate, which is steering and illegal no matter how you word it period...And you and me both know what your bottom line is to spend the least amount of money that you possibly can and if you have a deal with a drp they will be more entitled to help you out...

See this is where I disagree with you. Steering would be if they told your customer that the HAD to have their car repaired at the DRP shop. As long as they told the customer that it was their choice where to repair the car, it's not steering. Also the customer could have told them that taking the car to thier DRP wasn't convient & just had them come out to look at their car. That's what they have those white ford escapes for. And I know from experience that DRP's don't feel entitled to anything for me. Heck the ones I deal with nickle & dime me on every clip & washer. So that is just a misconception & not really the case. Don't get me wrong, I've been there & had DRP's mess up a job & when they do I stand by the customer & I've made the shop correct the problem. I've also had customer's bring cars back for issues that had nothing to do with the quailty of the shop's work & when that happens, I'll stand by the shop.

I'm not going to argue & say that Progressive may not have been wrong here. I wasn't there & don't have all the facts. I just really question the fact if they did anything illegal. Trust me, I'd like everyone to leave Progressive. It would just drive more business my way.

[ManwithNoName]

I had my passenger window smashed in, my wallet stolen with cash in it along with my cell phone and my iPod

The Auto policy wouldn't have covered those items anyway, even if you could prove they were in the car. Your Auto policy only covers the auto itself & not personal property. Personal property would be covered Section C of your Homeowners (or Renters) Policy. For example: if your car is broken it to & the stereo is stolen out of the dash. The stereo is covered because it is part of the car (bolted in) but the suction cup to the window mounted GPS or the Picasso you had in the trunk would not be covered (they are not part of the car). You could however, file a Homeowners claim for those items.

[Jamess113]

. Heck the ones I deal with nickle & dime me on every clip & washer.

If it's broken or missing due to the accident you owe it. So please tell me how that is nickeling and dimming? The shop had to pay for it and they are entitled to make profit on that clip or washer.

[ManwithNoName]

...The only people that has the legal right to negotiate any claim is the police holder or the the owner of the vehicle, Period!. Body shops and the insurer do not have any legal right to negotiate a claim. ONLY the vehicle owner, police holder or a registered member of the bar "lawyer or Judge" has that right. The insurers ONLY job is to sell polices and pay claims and that all...

Maybe someone can explain why in a dealership situation the mechanical side of the shop can be any where from $85.00 to $120.00 per hour but when you go 200 feet in the same dealers body shop, they can work for $42.00 per hour.

Jamess113, we can debate this stuff all day long but I wanted to address a couple of your issues.

On the first issue, You are are saying that the Insurance Companies should have the financial responsibily for the vehicle but have absolutly no power to negotiate. Seriously, how foolish is that. Look, the insurance company isn't there to hold your hand. You can repair the car how ever you want regardless of what our estimate says. Our estimate is just letting you & the policy holder know what we will cover. You want to replace a panel instead of repair it, fine but the customer shouldn't expect us to pay the difference. We can't force you to fix the car a certain way.

The 2nd issue is even easier to address. It's a simple issue of numbers. If you double the Labor rate to $85 an hour you double the repair cost. At the rate that cars depreciate it makes it no longer cost effective to repair the cars & the inurance companies total them. We total the cars, you have nothing to repair, you go out of business. Its that simple. I belive if you look into it that has already happened in some areas. I was talking to a co-worker in an area where the Area labor rate went up to $85 an hour & within a year 52% of the shops went out of business.

Look, I'm not trying to pick any fights. I'm on this sight because I love cars as much as you guys. And lets face it, there are bad apples on both sides of the fence. I've seen shop's blantly commit fraud & I've seen some insuracne estimates where the appraiser should have his head examined. I just want to say that the insurance companies aren't the bad guys. People really need to educate themselves on their policies & where they choose to repair their cars. I'm not going to debate the issue anymore with anyone here & I really hope no one was offended in anyway. I just felt the need to defend my industry.

Anyway, back to the Pro Touring cars we all love to work on!

[ManwithNoName]

If it's broken or missing due to the accident you owe it. So please tell me how that is nickeling and dimming? The shop had to pay for it and they are entitled to make profit on that clip or washer.

I agree 100%. It the car needs it, so be it. But don't tell me that the DRPS let things slide because that's not really the case.

[DarkoNova]

Flo is hot. Just sayin.

[ErikLS2]

This issue with insurance companies affects those of us in the mechanical side of the auto repair business as well. I work for a large mostly luxury car line dealership group and we will occasionally get insurance jobs when someone runs off the road or whatever and there's no body damage. If we get the job, it's usually at a lower labor rate and except for a few insurance companies for less labor time than our labor estimating guide (Motor). Many times, the insured will be told to take the car to a body shop for the lower labor rate. I will say that a friend of mine who does all our Ferrari, Rolls Royce, Lambo, etc cars usually get's authorized double book time to repair those, but there aren't that many of them and I'm sure their premiums more than make up for the added cost to repair.


Now to Jay's point about bodymen being more "artistic", I would just offer that we are both equally skilled and therefore should be equally compensated.

On the labor time stuff, I believe State Farm owns one of the big ones, Mitchell I think. If you think the insurance companies don't rule the world, think again.

Mr NoName, you make a decent point about the reason for the lower labor rates and a lot of cars get totalled too now because of the cost of all the airbags and other expensive stuff that needs to be replaced in even minor collisions. But, if you're going to come on here and make your case, which you did rather well, put at least your first name somewhere. We are not a secret society here, most of us.

[Jamess113]

Jamess113, we can debate this stuff all day long but I wanted to address a couple of your issues.

On the first issue, You are are saying that the Insurance Companies should have the financial responsibily for the vehicle but have absolutly no power to negotiate. Seriously, how foolish is that. Look, the insurance company isn't there to hold your hand. You can repair the car how ever you want regardless of what our estimate says. Our estimate is just letting you & the policy holder know what we will cover. You want to replace a panel instead of repair it, fine but the customer shouldn't expect us to pay the difference. We can't force you to fix the car a certain way.

The 2nd issue is even easier to address. It's a simple issue of numbers. If you double the Labor rate to $85 an hour you double the repair cost. At the rate that cars depreciate it makes it no longer cost effective to repair the cars & the inurance companies total them. We total the cars, you have nothing to repair, you go out of business. Its that simple. I belive if you look into it that has already happened in some areas. I was talking to a co-worker in an area where the Area labor rate went up to $85 an hour & within a year 52% of the shops went out of business.

Look, I'm not trying to pick any fights. I'm on this sight because I love cars as much as you guys. And lets face it, there are bad apples on both sides of the fence. I've seen shop's blantly commit fraud & I've seen some insuracne estimates where the appraiser should have his head examined. I just want to say that the insurance companies aren't the bad guys. People really need to educate themselves on their policies & where they choose to repair their cars. I'm not going to debate the issue anymore with anyone here & I really hope no one was offended in anyway. I just felt the need to defend my industry.

Anyway, back to the Pro Touring cars we all love to work on!

I want to start by saying I am not trying to start an argument or fight with you but I believe we all need to see the big picture from both sides. I believe and have been taught that insurers have a financial obligation to truly indemnify their policy holder wether its first or third party, although in a third party loss the at fault drive / tort feasor is the only one responsible to the damage he or she caused. I believe the only reason an insurer even writes an estimate is to take control of the repair. Its real reason to write that estimate is to set aside that money to cover the loss. If the estimate you speak of is to let the policy holder know what you will cover, why then are most insurance estimate written at 40 to 50 % of the actual cost to repair the damaged property? I can't remember an estimate from any insurer that didn't need a supplement. In today's environment it is a known fact that 50 to 60 % of people are cashing out because they don't have their deductible or need the insurance check to pay bills or just to survive, Insurers know this and in my professional opinion instruct their estimators to not include obviously need steps for a correct repair. This is called unjust enrichment. the estimate has nothing to with repairing versus replacing, its what will it take to put the vehicle and the vehicle owner back to a safe driveable vehicle and put him in the same financial position he was in prior to the loss.

On your second response. I believe in fair pay for the quality of work some shops provide. It would be my guess you are correct in the loss of 52% of the shops but I also believe the bad shops would be the ones to go out of business leaving the quality ones who deserve the money in the first place. I know of shops on many insurer lists who have had to buy back poorly repaired cars, with the proper payment for quality repairs the whole mess would basically solve itself.

I feel if insurers would do post repair inspections for first class repairs and pay those who do and make the other do the work over for free their wouldn't be any fraud from either side. But we both know that will never happen. Insurers writing estimate is a gold mine.

[Jamess113]

See this is where I disagree with you. Steering would be if they told your customer that the HAD to have their car repaired at the DRP shop. As long as they told the customer that it was their choice where to repair the car, it's not steering.

Steering is not the blatant saying "you have to go to this shop" its more of the word track the insurers use. If you were on the phone with an agent or a rep from your insurer and they said things like "oh.....that shop is not on our list" or "we don't work with that shop but if you go to XYZ we will be better suited to help you" or "Oh.....that shop...well... they over charge and charge for things that are not needed" or " if you go to that shop we will not be able to help like we would at our shop" or " if you go to that shop you are on your own". These are the things that scare most people because they believe their insurer, they wouldn't lie to me. This is the real steering issue.

[tellyv]

See this is where I disagree with you. Steering would be if they told your customer that the HAD to have their car repaired at the DRP shop. As long as they told the customer that it was their choice where to repair the car, it's not steering. .

I can see you don't get it thats why you work for the insurance company! You can't tell someone where to go even for an estimate it's just b.s.. What if every job you had to review went to your competitor first? It's just wrong!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So whats going to happen in the future is you guys are going to have a bunch of no talent parts changers in this business cuz nobody is going to want to do this for a living. God knows I don't want to work for a bunch of low balling insurance companies anymore.

[04ctd]

I don't think you can beat USAA for price & performance.

my wife pulled out in front a lady in a Stratus doing ~60 in a 35, flipped my F-150 extended cab on the roof.

cop said "wife's fault"
lady in the Stratus was looking to sue somebody :(

so we went down and got a copy of the ticket & looked at the stratus, and it had a sticker, from being bought at the dealership where my wife worked.

wife took the name off the ticket, looked it up, lady was 3 months behind on payments.
we called USAA and said "this lady is gonna sue us for everything we own, but she needs CASH NOW, she is 3 months behind on payments"

the next day, USAA called and said "your situation has been resolved, we made a QUICK settlement offer, and you are GTG"




my kid pulled out in front of some old fart in a blizzard, and he sued us for like $200k.
USAA offered him $15k out of court settlement. he said NO and hired a lawyer.

USAA paid to fly us across country (we had military transferred) to attend the trail.
USAA lawyer told me "be quiet, and act like you are in the military: yes sir, no sir"
told my daughter "don't speak unless spoken to, short answers"

dude got $20k on a jury trail, USAA did a massive investigation into his medical background, and ripped him apart on the stand.
so, at 30% for the lawyer, he prolly lost money going to court.

USAA Rocks!!!