Liberty Mutual Insurance Increased my rates by 81% without notification, approval, me asking for additional coverage, reason, or explanation due to signing unexplained documentation. Was set up. Charlotte North Carolina

This letter is intended to inform business HR departments, other insurance companies, real estate agencies, and all general insurance customers of the business practices of Larry Chester and Liberty Mutual Insurance.

My wife and I are both honest hard working middle class people. We have two children, a home, and two cars. We pay our bills and don’t ask anything from anybody. We mostly keep to ourselves and don’t make much noise. We do not have much disposable income.

My wife is an employee of Gaston County. As a benefit, Liberty Mutual has a group rate available to Gaston County employees. Larry Chester came to my wife’s place of employment and presented a quote that he knew was too good to pass up. Of course the rate sounded good and was suitable for our needs. At the presentation time there was no mention of a “consent to rate” form. This is how the clients are first signed.

The next year at renewal, Mr. Chester e-mailed with no explanation our renewal and a consent to rate form. He told us that we needed to e-sign the renewal and “consent to rate” and sent them back. The rates were still good at this point so we consented to that rate. In this e-mail there was only an attachment and no other explanation.

The following year at renewal, the rates tripled with no notice or explanation. At that point I called Mr. Chester and asked him why our rates were so high and notified him that I may seek other insurance due to the rate increase. He then adjusted them back down while I was on the phone with him. His ability to do this made me curious about the amount of money he makes from the people who do not call.

That same year I called him two times just to ask simple questions about coverage. He without any notification or warning recorded both of my phone calls as a $0 pay out claims. I did not know about this until I started shopping for another insurance provider. The $0 payout claims affected my renewal rate and by ability to seek another insurance provider.

When we found out that we could not change companies we decided to wait until the $0 pay out claims came off. Some time went by and one day we received a bill in the mail from our mortgage company saying that we were $830.86 short on our escrow account and on top of that our mortgage is going to increase by $120.00 per month. We were curious as to why this is happening so I called the mortgage company where they told me that my insurance went from the $722.00 that we agreed on to $1,306.00 that we didn’t agree on….no warning or notification.

We called Larry Chester where I couldn’t get him to return our calls for a week. Finally he e-mailed me a copy of the “consent to rate” form that we e-signed back in 2011. At the very bottom of the page in very legal terms that only an insurance agent can understand says basically that I give him permission to increase my bill over what NC says in necessary for as long as that document is on file. With any explanation I would NEVER sign that and he knows it…that’s why he didn’t explain it. To further investigate I urge you to Google “NC Consent to Rate”. The first thing that came up for me is “Consent to Rate is a Big Red Flag”.

Mr. Chester referred me to his office manager, Chris Lynch, who relentlessly tried to renew my policy at the high rate and very unapologetically and without explanation refused to budge or help on anything. We still haven’t gotten an explanation as to why the rates went up by 81%. These rates are even over what NC Insurance Bureau says is necessary. They definitely know and have known from the start what they are doing and prey on the working class.

Let this serve as a warning to everyone that in dealing with companies and agents like this be careful and NEVER sign a “consent to rate” form. If you are in an HR Dept, I want to notify you that this is what this outfit is doing and encourage you to discontinue business with them. If you are a Real Estate Agent, please inform your clients of this. If you are another Insurance Agency, please do not treat your clients like this and use this as a point to earn someone’s business.