Senior Farmers Insurance Agents Being Terminated?

Farmers Agent for 15 years. My business was growing at the rate of 10% per year, my retention ratio (Number of Clients renewing) was consistently above 96%. I was over 30% profitable for five years. I had not received one Customer Complaint directed to either Farmers or the Insurance Commissioner in thos 15 years. At 55 years old, you might imagine my surprise when Farmers terminated my Agency giving all my Customer files to a younger agent who received a 3% commission while I was receiving a 10%. The reason I\'m writing this email is I understand Farmers is targeting their agent for termination as they reach retirement age. Are their other agents who have been terminated for "no cause" or threatened who mighty read this?
T. Vacne Webster webstertv@aol.com

I started with FIG 01/15/1978 as an agent, receiving all kinds of tall promises about how great FIG was to work with, that I the agent would set my own level of success. There were not quotas or production requiremnets to be an agent. The fraud scam agent contract is very clear, there are no production quotas. FIG has taken it upon themselves to impose production requirements, which appear to target mostly senior agents. Thousands of agents were told "you determine your own level of success, build your agency to the level you want it to be at, then kick back and enjoy the fruits of your labor". Farmers is now terminating 100's of agents who are not producing the volume FIG now demands, even though the contract is clear about no production requirements. When they terminate a senoir agent, they take his/her book of business and almost always assign it to a new agent, who they only pay approximately 40% of the commission that they would have paid the senior agent who produced the business. FIG has been sued by several agents for this, and in most cases FIG has lost. Ex. Hall Vs. FIG. Former agent Ned hall was terminated because he did not like writting life insurance. The trial court awarded Ned Hall 10 years income plus $1,000,000. FIG appealed to the Oklahoma Supreme Court, and lost every step of the way. Unfortunately, most agents are not able to stand up to the evil empire who has endless sums of money to fight you with.
A couple of years ago there was an agent class action suit against FIG, because FIG knowingly charged back more commissions than they originally had paid the agent, when a policy was cancelled. I am told this went on for several years, with full knowledge of senior management.
There is currently an agent class action suit in Dallas, TX against FIG, because FIG failed to pay the bonuses they had promised agents for hard work and producing profitable business. R. SCHLOSSER RSCHLOSSER1@AOL.COM

Are Farmers Insurance Agents actually Employees? Judge Der-Yeghiayan of the 7th Circuit Court in Northern District, Chicago, IL will decide this in William Durst v. Farmers Insurance case no. 05 C 574. Former Farmers agent Durst sued Farmers under the Age Discrimination Act. He claims he was forced to resign after “continuous verbal harassment and questions as to when he was going to retire.” Farmers sought immediate dismissal of the suit on the grounds that Durst was not an employee but an independent contractor. Durst cited numerous examples of Farmers behavior where they had exerted control and supervision over him. See summary in The Voice Spring 2006 (page 29) Editor: Good luck Durst! I hope you win with the way Farmers Insurance intimidates, descriminiates, takes advantage of and controls its agents.

Are Commissioned Agents Protected by State “Franchise Laws?" "The Charts decision has not been adopted by Illinois courts. In Durst v. Illinois Farmers Insurance Company, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 2870 (N.D. Il. 2006), the U.S. District Court, applying Illinois law, explicitly declined to follow the Connecticut decision. In Durst, an insurance agent claimed he was terminated because of age and disability and without “good cause.” The court was asked to determine whether Illinois' franchise law applied to an agreement between an insurance agent and an insurance company. The court held that a franchisor-franchisee relationship did not exist because the agent did not have the authority to sell insurance without insurance company approval. As Durst indicates, Illinois courts have decided to reject Charts and follow the line of cases denying commissioned agents the protection of state franchise laws on the grounds the agents are not franchisees because the agents did not have the right to consummate an insurance company sale." Foley.com 6/24/2006

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