Frankenmuth Mutual Insurance executives and board of directors personify greed and corporate corruption. I hope you will investigate this because someone needs to share this with the policyholders who are paying much higher premiums to fund lavish executive lifestyles. Frankenmuth is refusing to advise me as to when their policyholder meetings are held. Below are examples of their conflicts and malfeasance:
1) Conflicts of Interest between board/executive staff are flagrant. Specifically, each year the annual board meeting is held in the first quarter at luxurious resorts in places like Cabo (The one and only Palmila) or Vegas at the Wynn. The executives host the board members and spouses, and executive spouses for week-long trips where all expenses are paid, lavish entertainment, meals, and penthouse rooms are covered. The last day of the trip, the board members attend the meeting wherein they vote on executive pay and bonus. This reeks of a conflict of interest.
2) The board members themselves are the best friends of the executive staff. They are all locals to Frankenmuth. Frankenmuth executives stack the board of directors with their friends on purpose. A Senior VP admitted that this was the only way they could ensure that they got everything they wanted without questions or anyone contesting/challenging.
3) Canned meetings vote in the board. The policyholder meeting is annually and only employees who hold policies are invited. They purposefully do not want policyholders showing up. They know that employees will never risk their employment by asking questions or challenging a vote or membership election.
4) Misuse of policyholder funds is frequent and egregious and solely for the personal pleasure/use of the executives. As a mutual company, their policyholders own Frankenmuth and its subsidiaries. They are accountable for being corporately responsible with policyholder surplus yet they ask the State for premium increases because they claim they cannot make profits. This company generates about 350 million in premiums annually. The executives spend disproportionately on themselves.
Policyholders would be outraged if they knew of the spending and lifestyles of these folks. I would strongly urge a forensic audit of the Frankenmuth books and in particular, the board and executive travel, gifts and tax evasion tactics. I would also urge to make public the information regarding pay structure, bonuses, golden parachutes etc. Frankenmuth is not a large company in the overall insurance business, however the executives spend on themselves as if they are a global conglomerate with Enron ethics.
If you could get a policyholder to write current CEO John Benson and ask to attend a "policyholder" meeting you would see how canned the meeting is. It's ridiculous. Demanding them to disclose their travel expenses, relationships with the board and trips with the board prior to voting on executive pay/bonuses would be eye-opening for the public.
I hope you have the power and courage to demand accountability from them and/or get other people of power to look hard at what's going on at this company because it is costing policyholders money via increased policy premiums that are going in to the pockets of greedy executives.
