Insurance and justice

Because of my basement flood last month I'm looking for a new insurance company for house and car. The quotes I've seen so far show I could save about $800 a year.

A while back I used my dad's subscription of Consumers Reports for recommendations for good agents. I already had a feeling my rates were high. Two of the companies referred me to the same agent nearby. I also contacted the member's agent through my credit union. Both of them gave me quotes from a company here in Michigan. That one was not mentioned by Consumers Report and both agents suggested I look at the company website and its testimonials. I dismissed that idea. If it is on the corporate website it is, of course, glowing and thus meaningless. That prompted me to Google the company name and the third link Google supplied was to a site that allows customers to report what they consider corporate rip-offs. Again, the actual content may be meaningless -- somebody, either customer or claims agent, was having a bad day.

Another customer's comments on that site implied the company had made a sizeable donation to the election of the Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court. Though the Supremes appear on the ballot as non-partisan, they are nominated by the parties. The current collection has been described as hyper-partisan with the GOP holding a one-vote advantage. The Chief Justice has done a lot that strongly favors the GOP, who nominated him.

So I Googled campaign donations in Michigan and found the Secretary of State Campaign Donation search engine. Yup, back in 2008 this insurance company (or a PAC at the same address) gave a $10K donation to the Chief Justice. And immediately under that one was a $10K donation from the Michigan Association of Insurance Agents. A bit farther down the list are two more donations. This insurance company donated a total of $25K.

Two conclusions: (1) I will be avoiding that insurance company. (2) This is confirmation that justice in Michigan will not support the common person