Guys, Ive been an independent agent in the industry for 25 years. If you think State Farm or any of the others are going to come running to you with a check over incidents like these, you're crazy.

The guy with the cracked trailer, that does sound like manufacturers' defect. Insurance is for catastrophic damages or accidents. Hitting the stump and breaking the l/u was paid for but the powerhead wasnt? thats' weird. If it all resulted from the same damage, then wtf?

But on the other hand, Ive had women take their cars to some fly by night oil change place, they leave the plug out of the pan, the car locks up and our companies pay to replace the engines. So there's plenty of stories both ways of insureds and insurers getting the short end of it.

Insurance companies are in business to make money, they make money by taking in premiums and not paying less out in claims than they take in premium.

For every story here someone has about how progressive ripped them off, Ive got two stories about how Progressive has actually come out on the water, towed boats to shore, gotten them fixed and claims processed quickly.

what about all these bogus 'hail damage' claims in the lexington area from the summer? To be fair, Insurance companies were the ones who got ripped off this time. 1000s of new roofs paid for and installed by insurers, but how many auto hail damage claims? My office processed 1. You'd think if the hail was strong enough to tear everyone's roofs up, there would be some damaged cars too. But Johnny bob down the road got a new roof, by god I want one too! some were legit, but most were small repairs, not entire new roofs!

I will tell you my opinion. When you have a good agent working for you, it will make all the difference in claims.