I had one of those cosmic moments just before the Thanksgiving holiday. I like coming into contact with clients who “get it.”
The story starts as follows.
I was contacted by our leading third-party administrator (TPA) asking if I would accept a job after a customer requested my shop services. The first question I asked before the CSR went over her insurer’s pricing limits was whether the client had requested OE glass, because almost all my referrals come directly from long-time dealer accounts. After a long pause, the CSR replied, “No.” I suggested she should check first before the conversation went further. She returned to me within a few minutes saying her caller did want original.
It turns out the client has a 2007 Acura and he wanted dealer glass. I had a chance to talk with him after the CSR dropped off the call. First of all, the customer says he made it a point to tell the TPA CSR that he wanted OE glass from the very start. After she returned to his line after my question concerning dealer glass, he was apparently read a script on what was “fair and reasonable” and he was given a price based on either that insurer’s or the TPA’s concept of that nebulous concept.
One of the first things my customer brought up to me when we talked was the “fair and reasonable” price he was given by the CSR. It seems he went on line and visited the TPA’s owner’s very own website during his claims contact time and got an online bid for his model vehicle. We both got a chuckle over the fact that the price quoted by the CSR was lower by around hundred dollars than what the corporate website gave him.
“They try to jam it to you,” he said.
“You, too,” was my reply since the difference for dealer glass would be $100 less if they allowed him the amount the website used for its cash price.
What I see is hopeful is the growing number of consumers who resist becoming lemmings. If I am right, one experiment being carried out by an insurer will fail. This is where a client agrees to have a data sensor plugged into his vehicle in exchange for a lower premium. What is not being said in advertising is that data from that plug can and would be used to determine if the client drives in a manner that is deemed “unsafe” by the insurer. That could cause premiums to be raised or claims or coverage denied.
Look at the tone and tenor of car insurance ads. Insurers have become hip, cute or just cheap. The fact that any and every claim will be managed toward the company’s benefit is a subject that is avoided. Who is approved to complete repairs and the basis for that blessing from insurers is another issue that could use some sunlight for its policyholders.
When testifying before a South Carolina legislative committee, a Nationwide representative once admitted that a single corporate shop received 80 percent of the company’s glass claims during a particular year. The remaining 20 percent was divided up between the state’s other 280 glass vendors. That shop and the TPA for Nationwide just happened to share ownership. A South Carolinian who purchased Nationwide Insurance may get into an accident, but it is obviously no accident that a certain glass shop receives preferential treatment in that state. One obvious question is: For how many other insurers that uses this TPA does that market share penetration hold true for on a national basis?
We as independents have the absolute responsibility to help consumers learn and discern the misinformation they receive when claimants contact who they think are company representatives. We should also seek financial support from OE glass manufacturers to help deliver that message since their own survival may be tied into ours as well. This issue just doesn’t involve the insurance sector of auto glass. I have no illusions that as that market flattens out to a no-growth status, those multinational companies who literally control large blocs of insurer and fleet glass installs will look for new areas of opportunity.
Independents should realize that we are providing the means to help them continue to dominate. Think of “participating shops” as sharecroppers because we provide the fill-in labor making it possible for the TPA’s owner to fulfill its contracts. We are told what to charge and are limited by that charge to provide a certain level of quality of product. They profit in some way even when we perform the work. Do insurers send out year end 1099s? No, the TPA does. Any payment delay is blamed on the insurer, but whose name is on the check when it arrives at the shop?
I realize many of us got into the auto glass business to provide us the means to make a good living. Perhaps some of us dreamed of becoming the founder of a chain of shops that would bring us success and wealth. Well, as things stand now, many of us are rapidly approaching the one percent status that the Occupy Wall Street movement rails against. However, it is only because perhaps we are only receiving one percent of the insurance work that is available in our area. The rich get richer and that maxim holds true very much so in our industry. It won’t change unless we push for reform. I’ve always worked to be a “one percenter” but not in this way.
