Progressive's #Fail in Social Media may be Warning to Insurers

In mid-August of 2012, Progressive Insurance Company lost their good reputation, satisfied customer ratings, and many customers due to a story of one of their customer’s claims being handled unethically. The brother of a deceased victim of a car accident used social media to shame Progressive Insurance in their handling of his sister’s claim. Instead of just paying the difference in the amounts between the claim and the underinsured driver’s insurance coverage- Progressive Insurance did what they could to avoid paying. They employed an attorney who was viewed as aiding the case of the driver at fault- and not their customer. Progressive Insurance did nothing wrong in a legal sense. They also did not expect the story of their deeds to go viral. Ironically, the amount of bad publicity from this claim and case in addition to the amount the company ended up settling with the family were exponentially greater than if they had just done the “right” thing and paid the initial difference to the victim’s family. Perhaps in the future, insurance companies will approach claims more ethically in the interest of avoiding publicity scandals such as this.

Click the following link to read the full article: http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2012/08/21/progressives-fail-in-social-media-may-be-warning-to-insurers/