4 Responses to “From Good Hands to Boxing Gloves: The Dark Side of Insurance”

• By Gary E. Blackmon on Jul 26, 2010

  This book should be an eye opener to all property owners. They are not on our side.
  Rating: 4 / 5
• By Brenda Hollingsworth on Jul 26, 2010

  I am a personal injury lawyer in Ottawa, Ontario. Reading this book clarified for me that the road blocks I sometimes face in resolving serious accident claims for my clients are more more systemic that I believed. This is an easy read, written in plain English for the average consumer. I read it on the beach and actually couldn’t put it down. I will be purchasing additional copies to provide to clients and to have in our waiting room. Injured Victim’s Guide to Fair Compensation
  Rating: 5 / 5
• By D. Wohlk on Jul 26, 2010

  Do yourself a favor and buy this book if you want to get very mad at the insurance industry and All State Insurance most of all. If you read this and have All State I promise you will drop them! This is a shocking book and one that I could not put down. I read it cover to cover in one sitting.
  Rating: 5 / 5
• By R. G. Roberts on Jul 26, 2010

  I’m not aware of another book of this quality, insight or ease of reading on this subject. The author devoted years of tenacious detective work and fact-finding in order to obtain insights and previously confidential information about claims practices at Allstate Insurance. His findings are credible and fact-based. His intellectual curiosity and inferential thinking are very strong, yet his ability to piece together and tell the story in simple, easy-to-read and highly understandable language are even more impressive. This is a first rate job of analysis of an important topic. It focuses on the claims practices initially instituted by Allstate Insurance in its automobile business and subsequently spread throughout it’s property and casualty business. The net effect was to greatly reduce settlements to Allstate’s customers and claimants while growing the company’s operating profits significantly. It both raises deep concerns about, and also helps to explain how anti-consumer practices of such great magnitude could have escaped the detection of regulatory and oversight agencies for so long.

  Since the book was published, sufficient additional information has come to light through the availability of respected management consultant McKinsey & Company’s work for Allstate that a follow-up version of this book would be even more valuable. Nonetheless this book is essential reading for individuals who believe that their insurance claims may not have been handled fairly by Allstate, or who may be considering the purchase of home, auto or other P&C insurance from Allstate. The practices perfected by Allstate, with McKinsey’s assistance, were pioneered by McKinsey at State Farm and elsewhere prior to initiating work at Allstate. Therefore investors, regulators or consumers interested in any of these companies will find this book important reading. Additionally this is “must” reading for insurance professionals interested in keeping their industry “clean”, attorneys interested in insurance law and claims practices, those interested in the preservation of corporate ethics and the rule and protection of the law in free market economics, as well as students of first class problem solving will all benefit from and appreciate this book. Overall it is an impressive, insightful, important and highly readable piece of work. I cannot vouchsafe that every single fact and interpretation is correct, but am sure that further refinement of the author’s findings will occur as more data comes to the fore.
  Rating: 5 / 5

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