Choosing a boat insurance is hard these days. There are so many companies trying to pull your business. But how do you know who will take care of you and who will leave you on your own. I want to give you a story about one insurance company who apparently  has wonderful service with auto insurance but they are lacking greatly on boat insurance. Let’s start at the beginning of this process. My motor dropped two cylinders while running on Sam Rayburn. I took my boat to an Certified Evinrude mechanic. Who is also a very reputable mechanic in this area. After a full inspection of my motor the mechanic determined the cause. He stated that a small peble was sucked into the water intake and held the thermostat open. During the warmer part of the year this wouldn’t have been such a problem but with cool temps it becomes a much bigger issue. Basically right from the beginning cool water was being pushed through the cylinders and never allowed the motor to warm up. The first two cylinders seized up. The mechanic said that the water is coolest coming through the first cylinders and warms the further along it gets through the block. That is why the first cylinders are the ones that seized. The mechanic fully tested out the oil pump which was virtually brand new. The oil pump test out perfectly fine. Furthermore, fuel was removed from the cylinders which definitively contained oil. Demonstrating that the cylinders did NOT run lean.

Now the dealings with progressive. First off I received a call from a claims rep in my state. But, because my boat shop was just over the state line she transferred the claim to a different rep. Once it was given to him I did not receive so much as a phone call to update me on the status for more than a week. I knew it had been looked at because I had been in touch with my mechanic and the rep had came by there. After a week I tried to track down someone who could help me with my claim. I made about 5 phone calls and got three messaging systems claiming whoever I was calling was going to be out for days. The claim rep was going to be gone for more than a week. His team leader gone for several days. Then their supervisor was apparently out also. Finally late that evening the supervisor returned my call. I explained to him that I needed to have this taken care of as quickly as possible because I had a major tournament the next weekend in which I had already registered. At this point an agent had already went and spoke to the mechanic and taken photos of the block.

Ok, here is where it really gets frustrating. The supervisor makes repeated claims that the block looks like it ran lean. Now for those of you who are mechanics out there the cylinders were black which from my understanding means they were definitely not deprived of oil. They were not burnt as if the water pump wasn’t working. They requested a fuel sample from the cylinder’s which my mechanic gave them and which obviously had fuel mixed with oil as it was supposed to be. I asked the supervisor “If my motor seized due to something being sucked into the intake would it be covered”. The supervisor said “yes”.  Although the mechanic had already went through and determined what caused the motor to seize the supervisor still continued to dispute the findings. He continued to claim it looked like it ran lean despite multiple instances of proof that it in fact showed it did NOT run lean. I asked the supervisor could I get my mechanic to go ahead and start putting the block back together so I could hopefully get back on the water by the next weekend for my tournament. The supervisor told me they were going to get a marine engineer to come look at the motor so it would be some time the next week when they could come look at it and the motor needed to stay opened up until they could look at it.

Let’s recap. Blown motor, certified and reputable mechanic determines cause, and major tournament the next weekend. Determined that something sucked into the intake cause the malfunction. Now not only are they disputing my mechanic they are also making the process take even longer insuring that I would not make my tournament. Sounds just like the wonderful commercial on TV of a quick claims service right. I could understand possible disputing a mechanic who was not certified and worked out of his house or something. They either A assume the mechanic is a liar, or B assume he just doesn’t know what he is talking about. I would like to know what mechanic school these agents went to. I want to know what credentials they have to deem them capable of arguing with a certified mechanic that works on motors for a living. The final straw for me was when the supervisor wanted me to leave my motor laid open and wait for a marine engineer to come analyze my motor when it had already been analyzed by a certified mechanic and it would make certain I would not make my tournament. The repair was only going to cost around 1100 dollars of which 250 was my deductible anyhow. I called the supervisor and told him I did not appreciate the way my claim was being handled and would like to cancel this claim and cancel my account. I have to wonder if this is what they wanted to happen in the first place. If you frustrate a customer enough they will give up and cancel the claim.

Through this process I spoke to several other mechanics and seemed to get the similar responses from each in relation to Progressive insurance. Two mechanics said they would not do claim work for progressive. One mechanic said he was getting very close to not doing claim work for them. Another mechanics response about Progressive insurance was “Good Luck everything with them is mechanical failure”.  I started asking questions to these mechanics to determine what insurance companies where good to deal with. I got the same responses from all the mechanics. The first choice is State Farm. Then second was Farm Bureau. So if you have the options I would reccommend skipping progressive for boat insurance and go right the the better choices of State Farm or Farm Bureau. I hope this review helps keep people from having the same experiences as I did.