Reported late last week, State Farm Florida is looking to shore up its finances and reduce discounts for customers… at the expense of those very customers. The Daytona Beach News-Journal reports
Trying to shore up its finances, State Farm Florida will eliminate or reduce some insurance discounts it offers to homeowners — leading to an average premium increase of 28.4 percent.
The move, which comes as State Farm prepares to pull out of Florida’s property-insurance market, will have widely varying effects on policyholders because they qualify for different levels of discounts.
Some will face large premium increases, while others will see little effect on their wallets.
But company and state officials said the biggest change will eliminate a discount customers receive when they go years without filing claims for fire, theft and other non-hurricane damages.
State Farm announced plans in January to leave the property-insurance market because it said its Florida subsidiary was losing money and in danger of eventually becoming insolvent. That decision came after regulators rejected a 47 percent rate increase.
With State Farm’s exit plan already in place, this means customers of the insurance giant will face higher rates as they are indeed dumped by the company. Shopping around for another company, if they haven’t begun to already, looks to be a fine plan for customers in Florida.