Insurance news story about Progressive should be seen as a warning to insurers

insurance news

Experts now wonder if this social media fail will generate changes in the industry.

In an attempt to save $75,000, Progressive Corp. has now found itself at the sour end of an insurance news story that has brought the rage of thousands, if not millions, of people against it.

Other insurers who witnessed the story may soon be making changes to prevent this from happening to them.

This type of insurance news, spread throughout social media, can be exceptionally damaging to the reputation of a company. This may mean that the insurers, themselves, may begin to change their strategies in order to protect theminsurance newsselves against policyholders who feel that they have been wronged by the firm.

Progressive found itself under significant fire online as the insurance news from Matt Fisher spread.

Fisher used his Tumblr page to spread the tale of his sister’s death in a car accident and the treatment that the family received from Progressive as they sought to collect on the policy that Katie Fisher had with that insurer.

When the insurer took the Fisher family to court, appearing to defend the other driver who had his license revoked as a result of it, Matt’s story went viral. Progressive took rapid action and came up with a settlement for an undisclosed sum, which the family has accepted. It is rumored that the amount was the amount that had been requested by the Fishers in the first place.

As most know, within the industry, it is not unusual that an insurance company will take the opposing party’s side but in this case there were some discrepancies that was cause for wonder. There was a witness stating the other party ran a red light as well as the opposing insurance company admitting to fault with a pay out, according to the Wall Street Journal article.

However, regardless of the amount that the specific case cost, the total expense from the backlash of this insurance news is likely to be far greater than just the settlement and court costs. There were a tremendous number of Twitter posts from Progressive customers who threatened to switch their policies to another insurer or who wouldn’t consider that company for their future needs. It will take a large amount of time for the insurer to be able to recover its reputation from the damage that was done.

Now, other insurers fear that they will face similar insurance news struggles, particularly now that consumers have seen how effective social media can be. It is likely that the industry will be facing some notable changes in order to better deal with these situations in the future.

 

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