Washington State Launches Online Insurance Complaint Comparison Guide

In a recent press release Insurance Commissioner Mike Kreidler announced a new Web-based tool for consumers, called the annual Complaint Comparison Guide. The guide allows consumers to search online for their auto, health and homeowners company and compare the company’s volume of complaints to other similar companies.

“Consumers deserve to know how their company stacks up,” said Kreidler. “Our Insurance Consumer Hotline receives more than 2,000 calls a week from consumers with questions about their insurance. While not all calls result in formal complaints, knowing how your company rates before your buy or renew coverage can give you peace of mind.”

A Complaint Comparison Guide can be generated for health, private passenger auto and homeowners insurance for the years 2005 on back to 2003. Depending on which line of insurance is selected, a report will be generated which shows the company, the number of complaints, the complaint index, the company’s market share and how much premium it collected.

A complaint index measures the number of consumer complaints for one company in relation to other companies in the same market. A company with a complaint index of 1 has an average number of complaints. A company with a complaint index higher than 1 has more complaints than average.

“Shopping around for insurance pays,” Kreidler added. “The new guide gives consumers one more tool to compare insurance companies. Anyone looking for insurance should do their research. Consider how much coverage you need, how much that coverage will cost, as well as the company’s customer service and financial strength before you buy a policy.”

The most useful piece of information is the ‘Complaint Index’ that measures the complaint ratio for one company in relation to other companies. A complaint index of 1 means the company has an average number of complaints. A complaint index higher than 1, means the company has more complaints than average and viceversa. One draw back is that most of the companies are divided up into multiple companies, for example Progressive has 7 different entries in the list, all with different ratios.