Employee, Ex-Employee, DM, and Agent Complaint Archives

I will be laid off this coming May after 20+ years with Farmers. I have the same sentiments. A couple of us though is thinking of filing a class suit action. Is anyone out there familiar with this case?

July 10, 2008
Trial Lawyers Pick 10 Worst Insurance Companies
The American Association for Justice (formerly the Association of American Trial Lawyers or ATLA) has published its list of the top 10 worst insurance companies with the byline: "How They Raise Premiums, Deny Claims, and Refuse Insurance to Those Who Need It Most." See 10 Worst Insurers List

At the very top of the list is Allstate. “While Allstate publicly touts its ‘good hands’ approach, it has instead privately instructed its agents to employ a ‘boxing gloves’ strategy against its policyholders,” said American Association for Justice CEO Jon Haber. “Allstate ducks, bobs and weaves to avoid paying claims to increase its profits.”

FROM WEB SITE: [lawandinsurance.typepad.com]

GOOD INFO AGAINST FARMERS AND ALSO LIBERTY MUTUAL WHO IS THE TPA FOR THEIR SICK LEAVE/DISABILITY CARRIER.

I am the spouse of a current Farmer's employee. The company has been a nightmare the entire time the he has been employed there. It continues to worsen with no end in sight. The claim load is impossible to handle at well over 130 claims, most of the litigated. He has been 'audited' on several CURRENT files that pass with flying colors of 90-100% passing rate. Then the 'managers' choose files from as far back as 18 months and audit those as well. These are files from a time when the requirements were different and not based on the checklist in place today and they are graded on CURRENT requirements. Those files usually score in the 70-80% range bringing his CURRENT score down to a level where he is now on a 'plan of improvement'. It is a program of failure if you ask me. If I were to purchase stocks based on performance 18 months ago I would lose my savings. The scary part of this is that they are picking and choosing which particular employees they want to 'audit' and put on a 'plan' and then fire them. What I have heard from other employees as well is that once your on one of these 'plans' you never have the chance to get off and a deadline is never set. You are then no longer eligible for transfer or promotion and are on the chopping block to be fired WITHOUT any unemployment benefits. It's a very sneaky way to get around paying out benefits and a very underhanded way to treat your most valued asset.
And now Zurich is buying AIGs auto contracts. God help us.
Thanks for letting me get that off my chest.
One more thing...why give your employees PO days if you won't let them use them without consequence? Just a question.

These actions are standard for Farmers. They know of no other way to treat their employees. They are corrupt unethical moron bastards. H/R is aware of these actions and support them wholeheartedly. You should name, names (of managers) on this site. At least it brings them out in the open (for everybody to see). Otherwise, they hide behind a cloak of anonymity. What your husband needs to do, is get the hell out of that shithole and move on. I realize, it's easier said than done but, something will come up eventually.

Farmers is the worst place anyone could go to work for today. The dm's lie and push you saying you can make money so fast and they do pay a salary sort of. My dm charged me for renting a space in his office which is where I have to start working. Since when should you pay to work somewhere!! Looking back I am such an idiot. The subsidy program is designed for you not to make it! I put in a life insurance policy to be issued and it took 35 days to go through. The last day it went through to hit my subsidy I checked Farmers system and it said it was issued. Great I made it! NOT REALLY! The next day it showed not issued I called in there was a mistake in Farmers system that delayed the issue. Farmers underwriters admitted being at fault and that it was issued on the correct day! However my Regional manager said that well i should have done one extra just in case! What if my goal is to issue 3 in three months then it is three not four! Farmers screwed me out of $6000 just on that alone! Don't get me started on being asked by my dm to forge a clients signature on a life insurance policy to get on the subsidy program! This place is corrupt! Please any new prospective agents, Please, For your own sake don't don't don't don't become a farmers agent! I can give you story after story of issues like this where farmers system is designed to screw you and your clients!

I know exactly what you are talking about. I am currently embroiled with a battle with a Claims Manager. 1/2 of our office has been fired or just plain quit rather than putting up with their bullshit. The atmosphere is chaotic, stressful and they keep promoting total idiots with no experience in Management positions. You are absolutely correct, once they target you, you are gone. And they do this for " Behavior" such as not being a rah rah cheerleader ready to kiss their ass. My colleagues are burned to a crisp with the work and then they give them more. Their training sucks which benefts no one. They change their procedures on a whim to screw the employees and the insureds at a whim. For example, the only pay for part of a roof that is damaged. What a load of crap and then when the Claim Adjuster gets a bad survey back with the customer clearly unhappy with the policy, not the Adjuster, who gets blamed? The Adjuster of course. At the local level, they have the absolute worst claim service possible. Hope your house burns down to the ground because that division is the only one that knows what the hell they are doing and will treat you right.

i worked for farmers in the help point in hillsboro oregon. it was hell. one thing they always do is change everyones work schedule, make them change teams and supervisors. i hated the work. the agents were always angry because farmers is such a crapy company.

I am a former Farmers agent from a presidents council DM. Everything I was told from day one was a flat out lie. They tell you that you are going to make it big and make all of this money and set your family up for life. When it came to signing my contract I asked questions about it and looking back I should have ran the other way. The answer I got was don't worry so much about it your going to be a rock star and this won't pertain to you. Well it did. I took off fast, got into the career program where I was consistently in the top 10% to 15% in the company for career agents. Everything that you hear from other people about fudging policies etc from other agents just so our district could win some promo that didn't effect anybody but our DM, is true. I also received my double blue vase and was very close to getting my crystal blue vase. After two years of doing this my wife had our first child. At first I continued to work the same way I did previously, be at the office at 7 and get home 9-10pm and work saturdays. I got sick and tired of not seeing my newborn baby that I backed off my hours and stopped producing at the level I was. So I get a surprise visit from my RDM telling me to get back to the old ways or leave, well here I am now writing this so I am sure you know what my decision was. Well now here I set after having poured my heart and soul into farmers and now I owe farmers $28,000. Not to mention I was spending close to $6,000 a month after the economy hit to keep my agency cranking like it was, and I did this for 4 months. Now I sit with no job, spent my savings, no money, and now farmers wants me to give them $28,000. Ughhhh sorry I don't have it, if I did maybe I would still have my agency. Now I am sitting here with a baby with no money and no job because where I live there are no jobs, not even Mcdonalds. I have to ask for help from friends and family just to keep food on the table, clothes on our backs, and roof over our head, and pay farmers. If anybody knows what I should do please post it. Thanks.

Yes, I was let go after over 20 years of employment with Farmers claims. Please email me your contact information,so we can talk. thanks Rod

I think i know who you are talking about. Our district office was named " Charlie's Abgels". As time went on, the males left or were terminated. He hired model like women and gave them " Books of business". one of them was only 6 months old in the business. I think that threw up a red flag and got him tho.

Did you keep copies of your folio statements? I believe we are all being cheated out of comissions by Farmers.

If so, please contact me ASAP

farmersliedtomeincolorado@yahoo.com

Farmers Insurance Career Program is nothing but a lie. The DM promised if I would be appointed with Farmers that he would give me a large book of business. Come to find out he never had the book of business to give and if he had he could not of given that many accounts to one person anyway. The whole recruitment program was a lie. At the time I was going to sign the agent contract all of a suddent they change the subsidy agreement to a plan that is much harder to attain. The DM made all kinds of promises as to how he would help me monetarily if I would sign and become a Career Agent. This turned out to be a lie also and when the DM was fired he owed me serveral thousand dollars in money he had promised. I saw office personel at the request of the DM forge policy documents. There was a agent in the office that was doing all sorts of corrupt things to try to get business and this was covered up by the district and the state office. They did not report this agent to the State Licensing Board and he is now working with another insurance company probably doing the same corrupt things. The DM was finally fired {allowed to resign}.

I'm surprised that no one has posted in regards to Austin Service Point. It use to be one of the top places to work in Austin about 4 or 5 years ago (old bldg and for the 1st year of AUSP) ...ever since the whole "mindset" change where they've gone to more of a call center attitude, it's no wonder that they're no longer in the running for Austin's top places to work. They have these ridiculous requirements in regards to meeting expectations and they low-ball you on salary/bonus earnings when you do meet. Now they have a rankings list which is ridiculous because they don't tell you the weight of the categories so you're blind going into the whole thing...I'm sure that they read these blogs and I hope they do because if they're not careful, when this economy starts picking up (even a little bit), I bet damn near half of that place will be gone. I would say, at the present time, that 70% of my co-workers are CURRENTLY and ACTIVELY seeking new employment...and for those of you who don't know, are internal scores (which show the % of employees that are satisfied), is really low..somewhere around 55%...THAT'S TERRIBLE. It's not a fun place to work anymore. Quit spending money on stupid "new state" trading cards and use that money to pay us more. Quit spending money on new chairs for a room that no one uses and give us new chairs out on the floor. They think they're spending a lot of money on salaries now?? wait until they have to hire 300 new people over the course of a year or so and the costs to train all of those new hires...which will, in turn, lead to even worse customer experience.

Also, train your agents that you hire. Quit sending them out to the field blind and wanting us to train them through the phone.
Also, tell your supervisors to quit questioning why we took a few extra mins. of "For Me" time to take a $hit!! We don't need to be baby-sitted.
Also, get rid of the high-priced food cart and get some real vendors in there that don't serve TV dinner food.
Also, STOP BEING SO DAMN REACTIVE AND START BEING PROACTIVE!!

For those agts out there that always question why they get different answers when they call in, it's because we're constantly being told one thing and then something completely different a week or two later. Upper-management(Jim Snikeris, Tom Rolling, Josh Sturm, Kurtis, Vince) are consistently flip-flopping when it comes to underwriting procedures, philosophies, and guidelines. They also state they'll have your back if you make a decision but then they always seem to throw you under the bus...so agts please don't be mad at us..if you don't like our answer just ask to speak to a supervisor and if you don't like their answer, ask for a director.

I was an agent with Farmers for over 4 years. Finally around the 3 year mark I had enough of their BS and decided to leave, but prior to leaving I decided to replace myself with another agent. The worst thing I could do was to leave all my clients stranded. Over the years I had seen what happened to clients after an agent leaves and I did not want the same for mine. So I went and found an individual that I knew was unemployed and I referred him to the D.M. The D.M. knew I wanted leave and he could not afford to lose all the policies I had brought in. So he hired this guy. Little did I know that this guy had a mess of issues to take care of. Such as a suspended Drivers License for D.U.I. and collections from unpaid school loans and credit cards. The D.M. ignored all that and even help pay down the collection amounts. Once he became a full fledged Farmers Reserve agent I trained him and turned over my office keys to him. I knew I was not going to be able to keep anything that I had built during my career with Farmers (Office Lease,Phone #s,Client Records). So I really had no better choice than to turn over my business and move out. During the transition I noticed that my replacement was taking money from client payments to pay his bills and payroll. As soon as I found out I called the D.M. and advised him of the illegal actions ocurring in that office. The D.M. ignored that fact and pretended nothing had happened. The D.M. went as far as telling the other guy that I was telling on him, and that if anything was going on it just needed to stop. The other guy was Co-Mingling clients money and that is against the law. The D.M.'s responsibility was to initiate an investigation, but he never did that. Soon after I noticed that there was insuffecient funds alerts being emailed to the other agent. The agent was taking in payments but never making deposits. I once again alerted the D.M. and voiced my concern. This replacement was not good for the clients or the company. The D.M. once again ignored what was happening. I finally sent in my resignation and got the heck out of there! By that time there was $7,000+ in missing payments. The D.M. finally steps in and does an in house audit so that this scandal does not leak out. He advises the agent to open up another trust account and continue selling because he needs to meet the district quota. He tells this guy that he will take care of it. During that time the agent is not allowed, by the companies, to take in cash payments. Even with that going on the agent finds a way to take cash and continue to take money. After a couple of weeks the D.M. figures out what to do to be able to keep his agent and once again ignore the real issue. The D.M. and agent get together and put blame on me for these missing payments. Since I was already gone, they had nothing to worry about. Little did they know that several months after I leave I get a notice from Farmers. It states that there was commissions owed to me for policies sold prior to me leaving but then there were debits for $8000. I freak out and call the Farmers accounting, they in turn send me over to the other companies they own. I call those companies and then they send me back to the D.M. I finally figure out that the D.M. reversed fees accrued to his new agent and puts them on me. The D.M. did not think this scam all the way through and I now have enough to get him fired along with the agent. However, I strongly doubt that a company like Farmers will go as far as acknowleding wrong doing.
Working as an agent with Farmers and getting to know the scum that run it, I doubt that the D.M. will get fired. Maybe the agent but definetly not the D.M. Will this ever go as far as the California Department of Insurance? I do not think so, in this district this would be the second time within 12 months where an agent has been found Co-Mingling. So as a prior Farmers agent I tell people to stay away. Farmers depends on car sales men type people to keep selling their product and then replacing them once they are used up. Prior to me leaving, Farmers began a new program called the "AAA" agency model. They grade each agent as if they were employees. Then the agents are given a 30 day notice to leave if they do not meet the new requirement. Usually it is being used on older agents that try and use their expertise and experience to voice an opinion.
As I always tell my clients, insurance companies are in it for the money and it is up to you as a consumer to educate yourself so that you do not fall victim. As for someone looking into becoming a Farmers agent, I tell you this, Farmers will take anyone off the street and make them an agent. So if you have more to offer than the average Joe, try them out if you must but always have a plan B and pray that you do not ruin your reputation because of them.
One last thing I forgot to mention, once you leave Farmers they do what ever it take to own your name. Currently if someone Googles my name, there is about 40+ site that show that I am a current Farmers agent. Once you click on that site you are routed to Farmers.com
I have spent about 80+ hours on line attempting to correct that information. So far it is working.

I worked for Foremost in the Pacific Northwest as a Claims Adjuster, and can only speak for working in that region. My list of specific complaints is longer than I care to list, but I would hate for someone to have to go through what I did. It was as if from my first month working for them they were trying to get me to quit: management/supervisors refusing to answer legitimate questions, missing meetings, changing my work quality ratings, changing my workload from too little and reprimanding me for not producing enough to more than could be done and refusing to approve overtime and then back again. We all know how the job market is now and if your only options are to work for Foremost or not work at all, I would advise taking the job but keep looking for another job. Also, and I believe this is a national policy, when they basically forced me to quit they had me call some kind of independent HR company where I was supposed to report why I was quitting and the only options I was given to explain why I was quitting were ones that made me inelidgeable for unemployment benefits. Don't call that number, you are not going to get a good reference anyway.

OH MY GOD I am going through some initial phases of becoming a reserve agent in Los Angeles, a few weeks into it. After reading about these utter NAZI tactics of Farmer's Ins. SUING their own agents and disposing of them to steal their books of business, I AM NOTHING LESS THAN INCREDULOUS. THEY ARE WORSE THAN THE MAFIA. Multilevel marketing at its most heinous. I RUN SCREAMING FROM ANY DEALINGS WITH FARMERS AS OF THIS SECOND. Thank GOD i read all these posts! I would have made a TERRIBLE mistake!

I was hired as an agent and told once I made my initial quota and became a career agent I would earn "salary plus comissions". Upon making my initial quota I was told that the "salary" is an interest free loan that must be repaid if you do not make your comissions for the first two years as a career agent. This two year period is broken down into sub-periods. I was lied to by my DM. If you are considering taking a position as an agent I would strongly suggest you consider other employment.

Wow. I used to work for Farmers in Orange County. It was bad there too. The Management only sees employees in a negative way. They tend to protect Managers and up. Lower level employees are screwed from day one.

As a former employee, I am happy to not work for Farmers anymore. I have talked to co-workers that state they don't know if they will be let go in the near future because farmers is not profitable. Well, news flash: stop wasting money on race cars, blimps, football fields, golf tournaments, etc. The scare tactics make you work harder. Since profit sharing was changed (to make you get more, YEAH RIGHT) the money the company saved has been wasted. I know they try to drive you nuts so you will quit and they won't have to pay unemployment benefits but hang in there, do the minimum and suck them for everything you can because, believe me, they are doing it to you. As a claims adjuster, I worked at least 9hrs. 45 min. a day & got paid for 8. They take a blind eye to working overtime but if they get caught, it is your fault and you will pay. I was fired because there was not enough work. They fought paying unemployment but I won. I am sure they are hating that. My stress level has dropped dramatically and I have got out of the insurance business. Farmers will continue to spiral out of control and will someday meet its destiny.

Hi there,
I'm not an employee or former employee of Farmers, but would like to speak with a former adjuster who can shed some light on their claims denial process. We've tried unsuccessfully to have a claim approved for hail damage following a strong hail storm in December 2012. 4 different adjusters were assigned, and we feel the entire process is designed to wear us out with the hope that we'll eventually go away. Anyhow, according to 2 different roofers the roof damage appears clear cut - our roof actually started leaking after the storm (we've temporarily repaired it). My husband and I are upset as my family and I have been Farmers customers for decades (obviously, that changed recently).
Thank you in advance for any assistance.
Erin and David

Don't become a Farmers Agency Owner. Their rates suck, the DM and staff will treat you badly and are unethical and if you make it as an agent there or not...you will be in tons of subsidy debt...

If you are looking for an insurance career. Consider being independent.

Check out the video on my website and let me know if you want to discuss the opportunity further.

www.insurme.com/2EE



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/21/2016 10:33PM by administrator.

I guess, it is my turn to add and I wish I would have found this site prior joining the Farmers in Collierville.
Sadly, the person had not compelled with the promises and had made me quit as well, had not even bothered to apologize and send the check on time. Not sure if I want to but perhaps will have to do something about that situation, with rudeness and harassment.

Would never recommend to join the "team", even though, have friends in insurance field and they are nice people, not this! Avoid...

Does anyone have a copy of a Farmers Agent Appointment Agreement?

Specifically an agreement that would apply to a 40 year plus Farmers agent.