CONFIDENTIAL TRANSCRIPT
April 2, 2020
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COVID 19 MENTAL HEALTH SUPPORT HOTLINE: Hello, how may I help you today?
ANONYMOUS PROPERTY/CASUALTY INSURANCE INDUSTRY EXECUTIVE: Hello, I need help dealing with my anxiety because my industry is the worstest victim.
THERAPIST: Ok, hmm. Please explain what’s troubling you.
ANONYMOUS: So here’s the problem. People think we owe them something.
THERAPIST: Well isn’t that your job? To pay claims? Or, as I’ve seen you guys put it, to be “on our side,” a “good neighbor,” keeping us in “good hands.”
ANONYMOUS: Hell no that’s just the TV ads. Our job is to collect and pocket money from our policyholders at the highest rate state regulators will allow – and let’s face it, most state insurance departments do nothing when we price-gouge policyholders. Then we get to sit on that money and pocket the interest without returning any of it to our customers, and then fight anyone who tries to force us to pay claims that we owe. And until now, we’ve done spectacularly well with that kind of business model! In fact, going into this global health crisis, we had amassed mind-boggling, record-breaking surpluses. Over $800 billion!
But now this crisis threatens all of that. Everything’s going haywire. I’m scared.
THERAPIST: Why are you scared?
ANONYMOUS: Well, I feel we're in some danger because people don’t like us very much during times of national crises, which I don’t get. Sure, after Hurricane Katrina we did everything we could to escape our responsibility to homeowners, many of whom were destitute. But how was it our problem that our customers were hungry, exhausted, traumatized and homeless? We had every right to fight them even when we were wrong. And after 9/11, our response was to march into the White House demanding a federal bailout that we absolutely didn’t need, and which keeps getting renewed. But we were just asking to loot the federal treasury like every other industry that had dumped money on politicians over many years.
And now, the $800 billion in excess profit that took decades for us to stockpile is threatened by businesses who think we owe them when we went out of our way to exempt ourselves from virus-related losses.
Now granted, we may have missed a few of those policies and forgot to exempt viruses here and there, but that was just an oversight on our part and we shouldn’t be punished for it, right? Businesses need to suck it up and stop suing us.
Plus, those mighty consumer groups are writing to insurance commissioners saying the windfall we are about to receive on auto insurance (since no one's driving) should be returned to policyholders! Check out this letter from the Consumer Federation of America and the Center for Economic Justice, calling for “lower auto insurance premiums for people who have stopped driving and lower commercial premiums for businesses that have dramatically curtailed their business and limited their exposure.” What kind of game is this?
And speaking of rates, when this pandemic began, we had already started raising rates on our business customers using our go-to never-fail excuse – U.S. juries and their terrible verdicts. In fact, we created our own lingo for this problem – social inflation. I know, there are compelling reasons why juries decide as they do and for decades we’ve complained about them anyway. And only 2% of cases end up before juries and we win most of them. But blaming juries has always worked whenever we’ve wanted to jack up rates. So we had to keep up the rhetoric.
Yet now, the entire civil jury system is on hold and American jurors themselves are sick and dying of a pandemic. It seems suddenly our entire PR effort has become, what’s a good word, insulting? Immoral? Tone deaf? Depraved? Un-American? We are being treated so unfairly.
THERAPIST. Well is there any good news you can focus on instead?
ANONYMOUS: Hmm, let’s see. Well there is something. Seems like Congress is interested in expanding the terrorist claims backstop to cover pandemic claims. That means if these claims cut too deeply into our mountains of cash, taxpayers will bail us out. That seems more than appropriate, especially if businesses start winning their cases or, god forbid, anyone forces us to retroactively pay claims.
And maybe Congress will even set up a business victim compensation fund like they did for families after 9/11. That would be extra sweet. They really should because if they put us in charge of distributing money by deciding which claims are valid, we can promise that no one will get anything! It's a win-win! (I just hope Chairwoman Velazquez took care of this before she got coronavirus.)
THERAPIST: It sound like you’ll be just fine even though no one else will. But why don’t you contact me again in a week to continue our session so I can make sure you’re ok.
ANONYMOUS: Probably not. My insurance won’t cover it.
Thank you for presenting this painful truth with wry humor. The beat goes on and on and the insurance industry keeps winning!!
Posted by: Marilyn | April 03, 2020 at 08:02 AM