SAFECO Auto Insurance

From this moment on, Safeco has sent me on a wild chase trying to recover the 395$ payment they took on top of the newer policy of 187$ payment they also took. Each time I call, I get a representative that tells me to do something (ie -wait 5 days, ask for a letter from the bank, provide a transaction history to prove my bank didn’t stop payment, email them new bank records, etc, on and on). This went on for 2 weeks. Meanwhile I’m down almost 600$ from my checking account. They refuse to refund my payment or prorate the original automatic deduction. Safeco has proved to have representatives who are not knowledgeable. They have put my family in financial stress. I strongly recommend a different insurance company.

The salesperson then actually said they were sending me a $175.00 check refund due to the low mileage affidavit. But, I then received a bill in the mail then for an additional $101.73! When inquiring, they said they never received a homeowner's declaration. I showed them where my email went through to the documents department, and how the salesperson had verified both documents had been received-they said they made a mistake. At the end of the day, we settled on an additional $22.21 premium, just to prevent me having a stroke from elevated blood pressure. At the end of the policy, I will immediately fire them, even if I have to pay a higher premium from another company. Spare yourself the emotional distress from dealing with an unethical company like Safeco? Brent

• And worst, requires us to do things they refuse to fund.

Not to worry. With Safeco / Liberty Mutual / all owned by First National Insurance Co. of America, and their GRN (Guarantee Repair Network) Fix Auto of Mt. Vernon, you get it all! And, as a bonus, they actually make the situation worse than when you started. If you’re OK being scammed and gaslighted, you’ll feel right at home. And there’s a bonus: it’s at your expense! Reasonably pathetic?

Experience: Upon the advice of Safeco, to remove a rodent nest in the engine compartment of our daughter’s car, we took our car to their GRN, Fix Auto in Mt. Vernon, Washington. Our daughter’s car, a 2005 Ford 500 was detailed and perfect except for ratso’s creation upfront. To remove the nest and clean up the heater / air conditioning runs they removed:

• The front seats

It looked like an IED had gone off inside the driver’s compartment. The photos tell the story: WIRES EVERYWHERE. We had to take it back because the A/C and heater were cross-connecting and cooling and heating at the same time. They fixed that and Liberty Mutual paid for the work. A few weeks later the steering system began groaning and jerking. Two days later we could put the transmission lever in gear…but nothing happened. It would not go into gear. It would not move. Never happened before…either problem. We then had to have the car towed to Fix Auto to fix the fix and they kept it for a few weeks…to no avail. They called to ask us the address of our mechanic. No explanation why. Aren't you FIX Auto? They had the car towed there.

• No written instructions to our mechanic

The story Fix Auto told Liberty Mutual about conversations was not at all what occurred, but Liberty swallowed it and decided they had to stay with their GRN. So began the troubles. The car sat. I had to call Liberty Mutual to ask what was going on. They gave me a list of diagnostics to run on the car. WHY ARE YOU TELLING ME THIS? I’m not going to do the work. No time-frame. Call the mechanic…which they finally did. The mechanic already had cars backed up for repair but did as instructed, but who was he supposed to send it to? Why would he ask that? Where are the instructions? The car sat on his lot, thus far, from June 3, 2022 until October 19, 2022: 145 days @ $7.50 per diem = $1,087.50. Who is supposed to:

• What is going to happen with the car?

WHO KNOWS? Liberty Mutual said they would cover the steering and transmission repairs ONLY if it could be determined that the damage was caused by the RODENT, not human error: VERDICT FIRST, INVESTIGATION AFTER. So we asked our mechanic his determination. “There is no way a rodent could possibly cause this much damage” was his response. HUMAN ERROR was his determination, sent to Liberty Mutual. We received a courtesy copy. Liberty Mutual responded with the same words,4 times: “We have completed our inspection for your vehicle and determined the additional damages are not related to this incident. Please see attached partial denial letter.”

My take: Humpty-Dumpty syndrome. They did such irreparable damage pulling the interior, functional components and wiring apart NASA would be challenged to put it back together. Apparently, they couldn’t. Our worst fears are now reality. We’re stuck. We don’t know:

• What to do with our daughter’s car, which she saved for on her own from ages 10-15.

WE’RE STUCK! It may occur to you to contact the Washington State Office of the Insurance Commissioner (OIC) for assistance and advice. We did. DON’T BOTHER. OIC acts more like the Office of Corporate Enablement. With all of the obfuscation and false reports that Liberty both swallowed and foisted, the OIC didn’t see (or look for) anything wrong. Bottom line:

4. Don’t expect your insurance company is “in your corner “. Disregard their slogans and advertising.

It begs the question: Is all of this hassle worth the paltry money this claim will cost vs. the business they will lose? News travels – good or bad. This is bad…and we don’t mind sharing it.

Today is 10/21/22 and I have never gotten a email, text or call returned about helping me with the accident. I was clueless on what to do, how I need to do it, etc. Not one person has reached out to me after 09/13/22 the day after the accident. Not a follow up, not an email returned and I do have proof of everything I am detailing in this review. If I can help one consumer make a better decision than I had by going with this company because Jerry said they were great. Yes greatly disappointing, great liars, great at bad faith insurance. On the night of 09/28/22 I thought to myself my insurance didn’t come out on the 26th or maybe I just wasn’t notified of it so I jumped on my checking account which whom I have my SAFECO payment pre authorized to take out my payment through my routing number. Sure enough no payment posted so I jumped on the SAFECO app and went to pay it.

As it’s not late yet, Autopay always comes a little early, and you have some time after due date to make the payment I thought it was just a glitch in their system and it didn’t pull it. I have statements from my bank showing that on the 26th of September I had approximately $9000.00 in my account and also a statement from them for my lawyer I am working with showing SafeCo did NOT try and run the payment. Well during this time in my account on the mobile app, in small print under a balance different than my regular payment of $61.00 and under this amount it says a remainder balance after cancellation of your policy as of 10/15/22. I was shocked how can they cancel me for no reason. Scrambling and so upset contact SafeCo, it took three days and many hours on hold when finally an agent through Jerry the insurance app that I went through to get the policy.

For whatever reason I could never get an actual SafeCo or Liberty Mutual rep not even the ones supposed to be handing my claim. So I go into detail explaining that it was supposed to come out on its own and it didn’t. She said, "Well it looks like the reason listed is that SafeCo has a policy that if your payment isn’t made more than once by the autopay, then they will cancel you." I explained that it’s only been two days and first time it happened was when I first joined with them and it was immediately paid. My debit card was locked and I do that often to prevent theft and that is why I decided to go directly though my routing to prevent that from happening and it was paid then and there. This was also part of the first policy.

This is a second policy which started in June and meaning this technically was the first for this policy but according to Wells Fargo they did not try to pull it and they gave me a statement saying so to give to the lawyer helping me. I also was advised to go in and take screenshots of every transaction every correspondence that I had with them but I ultimately literally took a screenshot of every page every crook every corner of that app in my account so they couldn’t change anything once the complaints have been filed. Because what they did to me and are still doing to me is called Bad Faith Insurance and I was advised to formally complain to the insurance Commissioner, BBB and he would be assisting me with all the steps to take and help me with the legalities of this whole mess.

They took my money for over a year and the minute I needed them to do what they are paid to do they disappeared, did not follow up on my claim. As of now it’s still open and I cannot get a person to answer me. I was covered during the accident so even though they decided to cancel me for nonpayment but then not allow me to make the payment either! When I spoke with Jerry about it they were just as confused because you cannot cancel a policy just because the auto pay didn’t work. It wasn’t my fault and furthermore I was there to make the payment and was told I couldn’t. She was just as shocked and confused as I was. She kept saying, "This can’t be right."

I also know that there are laws that prevent insurance companies doing this which the legal term is ‘Bad Faith Insurance’. They also have to give you time. They can’t cancel you because your auto pay didn’t come out correctly. It wasn’t even late when I went to pay it or figure out what happened. There are different dates for different reasons but as a whole they can’t cancel you for nonpayment but yet not let you make the payment. What they did was illegal, shady, sad and against Insurance Ethics by law. They lied to me and did not give me the correct information to help me move forward, they refused me by text, chat, email and phone even though I was just in an accident and had called everyday, emailed Giovanni several times and have yet to speak to ANYONE at Liberty or SAFECO was not notified about the payment either.

What they are doing and did to me is illegal and I can tell you this, if you are considering going with them or Liberty Mutual don’t. Do not trust a company that will blatantly practice BAD FAITH INSURANCE! I don’t care how long it takes, what measures I have to go through. I want them to understand that you can’t treat people this way that are your paid for a service and that means you must provide the service. You also cannot just decide you don’t want to represent me or anyone and not follow the rules the rest of the world have to follow. They are shady. They are con artist and they are thieves. I would die before I would never recommend this company even to my worst enemy. Shameful degrading tactics that are being investigated now because they will not steal my money that they did not work for.

3) Was told they are really good communication & customer service

Last November, 2020, I had my bank card ID compromised, so reach out to Safeco and updated my new account number and get the card back on auto-pay like it was. They took care of that and confirmed all information for me. I looked at the bank statement and the Safeco website to confirm this information was updated and the payment was pulled. It was.

At the beginning of March 2021, I received a collections company notice that I owed a balance for December 2020 for Safeco and needed to pay. I looked at the Safeco website and found that my account was charged for November and not for December+, and my policy was cancelled in Dec. When I called my broker he looked into it and found that they sent out 3 letters over 3 weeks, that I never saw, stating there was an issue with payment. They Never called me or emailed me, not even once. They Never contact the broker, which they are supposed to do, so they could address it before cancellation. (So he was really upset as well). I was under the impression I, my wife and Son driving were covered, and found we had been without insurance for 3 months. That was the scariest part!!!

Granted, I should have checked my statements to make sure this was still coming out, Totally my bad. However, since I was on auto pay for 2 years without an issue, and called to change to the correct information, they confirmed payment, I did not worry. When I explained to the Safeco agent what happened, they offered me new rates that were $150 more per month than I was paying with them due to the Lapse. I asked them to look at my payment history who confirmed, I was consistent, wasn’t late, and always communicated with I had a change in payment type.

They didn’t care and were not willing or able to help. Because of this lapse in insurance my costs went up with other companies as a result. I will NEVER do business again with them or Liberty Mutual because of the lack of trust and communication from Safeco. I hope you don’t go with Safeco or stay with them if you are. Please find another company that will actually help protect you.