Off the Cuff / My Other Journal

Bad Faith Has Many Faces

Throughout my life, I had a wonderful relationship with the employees wherever I shopped. Fact is, I like watching the people flit about the store more than paying attention to what I am buying. Maybe I’ve grown senile, but I don’t remember one bad experience. If anything, most people who helped me choose, buy, or pay for the goods were helpful, courteous, and nice. Were they doing what they are supposed to do, I wouldn’t know, but whatever the reason, I don’t recall having a bad taste in my mouth while exiting a store.

True, sometimes, long after the purchase, there were a few incidences when the products ended up less than desirable, but I don’t fault the gal or guy at the counter for that. That type of a flaw has to do with the company that produces low-quality goods.

Yet, not with a store, but with an insurance company, I have a bone to pick. This is in regard to the entry I made yesterday, concerning the 2004 hurricanes. For 40 years, my husband and I had been customers of Allstate through the two states we lived in. Our every insurance--home, car, liability, umbrella, you name it,--Allstate carried it for us. In all those forty years, we paid our premiums on time, never faulted, and we didn’t even bother them with petty claims.

During the 2004 hurricanes, not our main house but the outside structures had about $11,000 worth of damage. Allstate was very nice about it and paid us immediately. Within four or five months after the hurricanes, our property looked the same as it was before the storms, while some of the other houses waited for up to two years. So far, so good.

Before the following year rolled in, the company decided to drop several customers from their roster. Guess who was among them, even though they did it for only our prime residence? And their excuse: they dropped 100,000 customers, without playing favorites, mostly from Florida because of the hurricane damage to the state, but they didn’t drop our entire town. They dropped people randomly.

As a business, you hold on to your better customers, especially tried and true ones. You don’t f.&#* them up without a good reason, or your business will suffer. Frankly, I don’t want anything to do with Allstate whatsoever as long as I live. According to US insurance laws, an insurance company’s duty is often referred to as the "implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing." Does randomness in backstabbing customers show good faith and fair dealing? I guess lawyers can stretch anything toward their ends, but I think quality has nothing to do with randomness.

My husband still keeps some of the insurances with Allstate, still innocently believing in their *good will*, which isn’t what I would do. I have to say my husband is nicer than I am and has a cooler head. He, too, was upset with the company and understands where I stand, but also says it is too difficult to redo everything and go through all that paperwork. He is the one paying, so I don’t get into a fight over it, but if I have to do the paying at any one time in my life, it will be good-bye Allstate, paperwork or not.

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Prompt: What’s the most dreadful, or wonderful, experience you’ve ever had as a customer? How could it have been better or worse?