We asked those who had switched what led them to leave their previous insurer. More than half (58 percent) said their current insurer offered better rates. The second most common reason was also related to cost: 41 percent said their old insurer raised their premium. Overall, nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of policyholders in the U.S. who switched car insurance companies did so for one or both of those premium-related reasons.
Far less important to these “switchers” were factors like an insurance agent’s professionalism, a bad experience filing a claim, an unsatisfying service response, a company’s reputation, and advertising, each of which was indicated by less than 8 percent of this group.
“It doesn’t pay to be loyal to your auto insurer just for the sake of loyalty,” says Martin Lachter of Consumer Reports’ survey research unit. “Policyholders should shop around every couple of years for better rates, and with the online tools that are available, that’s not very hard to do.”
As the infographic below illustrates, some insurers saw more customers join them than leave. It provides insight into where policyholders are finding better rates—and where you might as well.
We asked them about their current insurer and the one they had switched from, which revealed what percentage of customers each company gained and lost in the past five years. From this, it’s clear that NJM is winning the switching game. Among its customers who made a switch one way or the other, the survey showed that 91 percent joined NJM, with just 9 percent leaving. Next on the list are Acuity and Erie, whose 3-to-1 switching ratios showed them gaining cost-conscious customers.
At the other end of the scale is Nationwide, with switching rates of 28 percent to and 72 percent from, meaning it lost almost two-and-a-half times as many customers as it gained. Farmers and Kemper are just ahead of them with ratios near 1-to-2 for gaining and losing customers.
Among the four most popular car insurance companies in our survey, Progressive and State Farm have solidly positive switching ratios, while Allstate and GEICO are in the negative range.
Based in New York, Stephen Freeman is a Senior Editor at Trending Insurance News. Previously he has worked for Forbes and The Huffington Post. Steven is a graduate of Risk Management at the University of New York.