"Deal, or No Deal?"

 Either the Governor of Florida or Allstate is not telling the truth. The lead front page story of the St. Petersburg Times stated the following:"Gov. Charlie Crist confirmed the Allstate offer was floated recently, and he promptly rejected it. Allstate officials said.....that no offer had been made." Which is it?

Is Allstate accusing the Governor of making this up? Maybe they are playing the "would ya, if I coulda , then ya shoulda" game where no offers are "officially" made? Still, Allstate better get its agents back on the reservation because they claim Allstate offered $10 million. I know Charlie Crist. He has always been up front regarding his views even if I do not agree with him. Our relationship is good enough that when I told him I was supporting another friend for Governor, Jim Davis, Charlie said he understood, but hoped I would reconsider in the future. The Allstate spokesperson's version of the truth is another matter. Throughout the ordeal regarding McKinsey documents, Allstate maintained those claims documents had nothing to do with Homeowners' claims. I told the press Allstate was simply not telling the truth. Now that Allstate has placed those documents on its website, everyone can see Allstate lied, because McKinsey "redesigned" the methodolgy for handling homeowners claims as well. Allstate's ads ask, "Whom do you trust?" The answer should be clear to everybody--not Allstate .  

 

Times Story Not Accurate

 

The St. Petersburg Times ran a story regarding our firm's involvement with influencing pro-policyholder legislation and regulation.  One would think that if the insurance industry was truly most interested in their customers, they would support our efforts. The exact opposite is what happens, and my impression of the worst offenders in Florida are Citizens, Allstate and State Farm. These three insurance companies (Citizens is actually a governmental entity, by legislation it lobbied for) lobby our regulators and legislators to block laws that support and protect consumers as well as limit what few rights policyholders have through statute. Their financial and manpower resources are significant. These resources implemented through studied strategy along with well crafted propaganda in the news and ads make them formidable opponents to laws that would even the playing field for policyholders. Heck, they even have their bought for legislators use scare tactics if such pro-policyholder laws or enforcement of the same were to occur as exemplified in this past Thursday's front page article regarding insurance reform.

We sent a letter in response to inaccuracies of the Times article.

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Allstate Does the Right Thing

The Florida First District Court of Appeal upheld the Florida Office of Insurance Regulation's suspension of Allstate writing any new policies in an opinion issued last Friday.  Allstate had refused or was slow producing documents to the Department as it investigated Allstate's role in duping Florida legislators and regulators into passing legislation which should have resulted in lower rates.  This was an important legal decision and the news media picked up on it right away. (Boston Globe; Tampa Tribune; Chicago Tribune) Within hours of the decision, Allstate placed over 150,000 previously "secret" documents regarding its claims practices on the Web Friday night.

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