Farmers Group Reviews

Pros

working for a large national company.
working for an even larger international company (Zurich).
steady hours.
good work/life balance.
ability to relocate.

Cons

repetitive, boring work.
felt like an assembly line.
having to constantly argue with contractors and unhappy policy holders.
having an outgoing personality is definitively not good for this position.

Advice to Senior Management

There isn't really much advice to management you could give in my situation, i just didn't like the work period. The atmosphere was okay, but it was the job itself that really killed my personality. I felt like a drone in this place.

Pros

Great pay, great people, room to grow, great future ahead of it with a combined ratio of $1.02, expanding fast.

Cons

No real complaints. You do your job and they leave you alone. The only thing perhaps would be that they boast the #1 training award out of any company, so the expectations are high. Unfortunately, they probably got the award because they spend the most $$$ on training, not that they have the best training necessarily.

Advice to Senior Management

Make the training more efficient and applicable to the actual job. Also, the training needs to be more interactive if you want to step it up to the next level.

Pros

Retirement benefits and annual bonuses (if paid out)

Cons

Career progression is very slow

Advice to Senior Management

Recognize talent and reward it with a competitive salary.

Pros

Good benefits, vacation time
Big company, could be room for advancement

Cons

intense workload, minimal support, unrealistic expectations

Pros

Recent changes to career path have guaranteed 5% at the time of promotion. Medical and Dental effective 30 days from start date. If you have a good team and good supervisor, the job is more tolerable.

Cons

HATE PTO and flex-time system. Forced to use vacation days for errands due to shift. Career path, as admitted by management, was accelerated to force people to stay in their current shifts. Good luck trying to get out of work before 8 PM without taking PTO. If your supervisor drops the ball on anything, too bad for you. Learn that now. Premiums increased on medical benefits; plans are too expensive with high deductibles. And finally, they promise that you can apply to different departments once you are hired but those positions are very competitive, and if you get promoted within your department, you are locked into that position for 1 year. In other words, you have to turn down promotions and hope that a position opens up a year later. Cross your fingers cause you're lucky if you even get an interview.

Advice to Senior Management

Get away from the current "stats" system. You're only rewarding people who half-ass their job and not the people who are actually solving our customers' problems.

Pros

Company car with personal use available, not stuck at a desk all day, get to meet a lot of interesting people, ability to make over-time pay

Cons

Objectives and goals change often, decisions are often over-ridden without explanation, lack of communication with superiors if you don't get much face time, inferior computer equipment due to effort to cut costs.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to your front line guys. Get rid of Servicepower and allow the adjusters to competently schedule their time. Look at your employee's activities to see where they are and what they have going, handle the phone call you received, don't always dump it back on the employee if they don't have time in their schedule to adequately address it.

Pros

- Great compensation for top peformers
- Fun group of people to work with
- Flexible schedule
- High level of responsibility
- Well-respected company

Cons

- "Churn and burn" attitude
- Quantity over quality
- Pressure to make numbers at any cost leads people at all levels to make poor decisions
- Management has a subjective attitude toward unethical behavior, or in some cases, just turns a blind eye to it for as long as it suits them

Advice to Senior Management

Having reasonable expectations will keep people honest. Focus less on numbers and more on doing the right thing. Provide more structure for RDM training and less micromanagement for DMs. Stop trying to recruit so many agents, and work on having a smaller group of stellar performers. This will also enable DMs to focus attention and resources on the stars, rather than spinning their wheels trying to force anyone and everyone through the system.

Pros

Fair compensation for job duties
Comparable benefit package
Work and personal life balance

Cons

Narrowed opportunity to grow and advance
Bumbling supervisor and management staffs
No relaying of information from the top
Treating customers with limited dignity and respect
Lacking team cohesion

Advice to Senior Management

Look at the call-center and engage with employees as to why they are so dissatisfied with the jobs. Have a truly opened door policy for addressing concerns that could make substantial differences. Recognize true talents instead of cherry-picking.

Pros

Get to build a business in which you are personally responsible for the execution and growth of your business. Income is up to you to be able to sell the products and services that generate your income. The claims department was very effective in the claims that I had and left a very positive taste in my mouth.

Cons

Although you can work when you want, you are still held captive to only sell products and services that Farmers provides. When the pricing of the insurance products are not competitive in the marketplace, you ability to build business is hindered severely due to lack of options to provide your clients and inability to negotiate rates with the company. Although you cannot control the price of the product, you still must perform business growth objectives in order to keep you contract with Farmers. Basically and agent at Farmers is a glorified employee that can work when they want.

Advice to Senior Management

Start caring about your agents. Agent saturation is ridiculous and demonstrates your lack of concern for your agents success. In Colorado Springs alone, there were over 100 agents compared to other companies at about 30 max. When pricing on products become uncompetitve as they have been the past two years, the oversaturation of agents makes it impossible for your agents to be successful as you request. Put actual effort into establishing a productive relationship with your agents. Although I understand your desire to grow your business, you need to take care of those that are willing and desiring to do so.

Pros

the products are good, commission rates are not bad, and the company image is ok

Cons

i don't like the structure they have, you have to meet some minimums and then they pay you some money that you have to pay back. its all blurry to me and the management didn't help to clarify.

Advice to Senior Management

at least be honest about the program you have and tell it like it is so i can respect you.