In 2010, The Division of Insurance received 23,294 calls to its insurance consumer hotline (the last year for which the data is available.) As Agency Checklists wrote in its first article on the Insurance Consumer Hotline, the Division estimates that one in every 12 calls made to the hotline constituted a formal insurance complaint. Furthermore, it estimates that over 500 of the complaint calls involved a consumer’s private passenger automobile insurance.
Complaint Ratios*
In addition, according to The Division of Insurance, one of, if not, the most frequent question from consumers concerns the reputation of a particular insurance company. As a result, each year the Division compiles and publishes updated complaint ratios for the major insurers in both the private passenger automobile and homeowner’s insurance marketplace.
The Division calculates these ratios by comparing the share of complaints filed against a company to that company’s market share. The DOI says it “…then normalizes the figure to a ratio of $10 million in premium written in order to control for the different levels of market share.”
This fact alone shows that more often than not most insureds know very little about the actual insurance company from which they get their insurance. Helping your insureds know more about the particular company they are buying insurance from makes for more informed insureds and happier clients.
Here are the complaint call numbers on The Top 20 Insurance Companies who write private passenger automobile insurance in the Commonwealth.
2010 Private Passenger Automobile Insurance Complaints and Market Share
Company Name |
Premium Share in 2010 |
Complaints Filed in 2010 |
Complaints per $10,000,000 in Premium |
| Commerce Group |
28.20% |
173 |
1.65 |
| Safety Group |
11.16% |
68 |
1.64 |
| Liberty Mutual Group |
11.07% |
50 |
1.22 |
| Arbella Insurance Group |
8.94% |
38 |
1.15 |
| Plymouth Rock Assurance Corporation |
5.53% |
33 |
1.61 |
| Travelers Group |
5.14% |
55 |
2.89 |
| Metropolitan Group |
5.14% |
53 |
2.78 |
| Amica Mutual Group |
3.47% |
22 |
1.71 |
| Hanover Insurance Group |
3.40% |
29 |
2.30 |
| Progressive Group |
3.36% |
23 |
1.84 |
| United Services Automobile Association Group |
2.19% |
5 |
0.62 |
| Berkshire Hathaway Group |
2.08% |
0 |
0.00 |
| Quincy Mutual Group |
1.80% |
6 |
0.90 |
| White Mountains Group |
1.44% |
13 |
2.44 |
| Allstate Insurance Group |
1.24% |
13 |
2.83 |
| Main Street American Group |
1.24% |
4 |
0.87 |
| Norfolk & Dedham Group |
1.18% |
6 |
1.37 |
| Vermont Mutual Group |
0.83% |
0 |
0.00 |
| IAT Reinsurance Company Group |
0.56% |
0 |
0.00 |
| State Farm Group |
0.41% |
1 |
0.65 |
| Remainder of Market (17 Companies/Groups) |
1.63% |
29 |
4.80 |
*Facts and figures courtesy of The Massachusetts Division of Insurance
