This happened some years ago. It was quite common for insurance companies to set up a booth at a shopping centre or bus depot, where they would approach passers-by and ask them to do a survey so they could promote their insurance plans. They had a reputation for being extremely aggressive, harassing easy targets like young students or elderly people, in order to meet their quotas.

My sister and I were at a bus depot. It was pretty crowded, so she was several paces ahead of me. We walked past one of these insurance booths, with agents waylaying passers-by.

Agent: “Can you help me to do this survey?”

Sister: “No, thanks, I’m in a hurry.”

Agent: “It’ll just be a few minutes.”

Sister: “I’m rushing to catch my bus.”

Agent: “It’s just a few minutes! My colleague will tell you more.”

She proceeded to GRAB my sister’s arm and physically DRAG her roughly over to the booth! Alarmed, I ran after them.

Agent: “Okay, we have this plan.”

She started to take out some brochures.

Sister: “My bus is here!”

Agent: “Oh, it’s okay! You can wait a few minutes for the next one. Now for this…”

She started to talk about their insurance

The bus left. My sister looked exasperated as she sat down, but I could see what she was about to do, so I stayed outside.

The agent talked for maybe fifteen more minutes, until the next bus arrived. My sister got up.

Sister: “Okay, I had a good rest. My bus is here.”

Agent: “Would you like to buy this plan?”

Sister: “As I said, I’m in a hurry. I’ve missed a bus, and now I’m even later. I was just sitting here to rest my feet.”

She got up and left. The agent gave her a black look, but my sister did say she wasn’t interested in the insurance plans; it’s not her fault that the agent wasn’t listening.

I work in an insurance call center handling complex technical calls and taking escalated calls. Most of my calls are ho-hum technical calls. I handle escalations about billing and underwriting, which are usually a variation of “How dare you tell me that you won’t insure me for free?!” I work swing shift, so I handle more than just the Garden Variety Crazy or Demanding Entitled Brat; I handle the ones who are willing to call an insurance company at 2:00 am to yell at someone.

I get a call from a member of our online team. He’s had to escalate a chat up to me because the customer will not accept the answer he’s been giving for the last half-hour. In writing, no less. She has also made some changes to the policy while online with my rep, including deleting a driver.

When an online rep escalates to yours truly, it entails the online rep calling out to the customer first. This particular online rep is a perfectly lovely individual with a distinctive accent. Apparently, the accent got under the customer’s skin to the point where she used racial epithets on him repeatedly.

I introduce myself.

Customer: “I want to know where you are physically located, exactly.”

Her emphasis on the word “exactly” is so snotty and condescending that I am tempted to provide her with the latitudinal and longitudinal coordinates just to mess with her head. But she’s not worth the time, so I give her only my state.

Customer: “You are withdrawing $300 a month from my checking account. I only agreed to $70 a month! You are committing fraud and I want $1,200 back. I worked as a court reporter and I know all about how the law works.”

I note that her current policy term has been active for a little over four months. We sent out a renewal offer back in the middle of July. The policy renewed in late August. The renewal offer included a payment schedule for $300 a month, starting with the renewal date. Along with a billing schedule is a summary of what changes have been applied, including changes to her child’s rating status. She has enrolled in online documents for everything, so I refer her to her emails.

Customer: “Oh, I got the emails, but they weren’t urgent enough for me to read. You guys need to tell me when something’s urgent so I’ll pay attention to it. And I didn’t give you c**ksuckers permission to change my kid’s status, so you did something that you weren’t supposed to do.”

Me: “We’re only obligated to send out the renewal offer to the address you’ve provided. Verification of your reading of those notices is not incumbent upon us per the Department of Insurance. And by making your initial down payment with us back on [date], you agreed to terms and conditions we’ve outlined in our policy contract. We’re merely enforcing the contract terms upon which you’ve agreed.”

Customer: “Well, that’s unethical, and we’re in the middle of a health crisis. I told your [racial slur] salesperson not to put [Child] on my policy because I can’t afford the insurance for him. Your salesman forced me to add [Child] because he lives in my household and drives my vehicle now that he has a driver’s license.”

I note that her child was just deleted from her policy.

Me: “I’m sorry you feel that adherence to a contract is unethical. Also, I will ask you to keep this call professional, or we will discontinue this conversation. Now, does [Child] still operate your vehicle or live in your household?”

Customer: “Yes, but I don’t want him on my policy because I don’t want to pay $300 a month for insurance. I should only be paying $70 per month. And are you going to be giving me $1,200 back or what?!”

Me: “[Child] needs to be added back onto your policy as a rated driver, then. Should you choose not to have me add him onto your policy, I will be referring this policy to our underwriting department, who will add him on for you. Furthermore, as you’ve admitted on a recorded line that you received the email, we will not be accommodating any request to refund you that money, as there was no error made.”

The customer then calls me a c*** and tells me I’m horrible at my job. I tell her I’m sorry she feels that way, but she has a choice to make. She hangs up on me after calling me a “F****** STUPID B****” at the top of her lungs.

Right as I’m documenting how unhinged the customer is and submitting an underwriting review, my boss messages me. It’s a string of three emojis: big eyes, whew, big eyes again.

Boss: “Are you okay? That was rough.”

Me: “I’ve been called worse by better, but can this call get me something like hazard pay?”

Boss: “Well, funny you should mention that, because I’m messaging you to go over raise information. Call me on our conference line.”

My boss had put me in for the max percentage bump this year. He was doing silent monitoring because he was completing the annual reviews for said raise. His words: “You’ve definitely earned it.”

The job can be tedious, but it’s that much better when you have a boss who recognizes how hard you work and that you’re good at your job.

My mom realizes she has no information on my dad’s life insurance policy other than the name of the company. She calls to see if they can give her the missing information. She explains the situation and verifies my dad’s name, social security number, birthday, etc., and my dad gives the agent permission for my mom to speak on his behalf.

Agent: “Do you have the policy number?”

Mom: “No. Like I said, that’s why I’m calling. I have no info other than your company’s name.”

Agent: “Can you verify the name of the beneficiary?”

Mom: “It should be [Mom’s Full Name].”

Wrong. She tries my name, my sister’s name, and my grandparents’ names. Nope. My mom is transferred to a supervisor and goes through verifying my dad’s information a second time, and again, my dad grants her permission to speak on his behalf. The supervisor goes through all the same questions with the same answers.

Supervisor: “If you can’t give me any other information, do you at least know the year you activated the policy?”

Mom: *Guessing* “2016?”

Supervisor: “No.”

Mom: “2015?”

Supervisor: “No.”

Mom: “2014?”

This kept going until she guessed the correct year, in the early 2000s. The supervisor was then able to give my mom the information. The beneficiary? My mom. But someone made an error and her middle name was listed as her first. How they were able to give her the information after she guessed the year but not from all of the rest of the information, I’ll never understand.

I work as a licensed insurance agent for an agency that exclusively represents one of the largest insurance companies in the country. One day, I received a call from a client who needed to submit a claim on his automobile insurance. I got him successfully transferred to the claims department to get this done. Ten minutes later, my phone rings again.

Me: “Thanks for calling [Agency] of [Company]. My name is [My Name]; how can I help you?”

Customer: “Hi, [My Name], this is [Customer]. You helped me get my claim submitted earlier?”

Me: “Yes, [Customer], what can I do for you now?”

Customer: “The claims department from [Company] sent me a text with my claim number in it. At the end of the text, it says to reply with the word ‘STOP’ if I don’t want to continue to receive texts. What is this?”

Me: “That just means that if you want to keep receiving texts about your claim, then don’t do anything. But if you don’t want to be bothered with the texts, then reply with the word ‘STOP.’”

Customer: “Okay, but am I continuing to receive this text now? I don’t want that.”

Me: “I’m not sure I understand, sir.”

Customer: “Is this text continuing to come to me if I don’t send the word ‘STOP’? I don’t want to use that much data. I don’t want to be charged for that.”

Me: *Head on desk* “No, no, sir. That isn’t happening. That text has ended.”

There are two agents in the office; I can only take payments for the one I work for as, when I type in a name, only his customers will come up. The other agent is busier than ours, so their customers will sometimes try to pay with me instead of waiting.

A guy comes up and gives me his name. The last name comes up, but I am unsure of the first. I repeat it back to him and verify the address. He pays and I give him a receipt.

He comes back later.

Customer: “You stole my money! It’s not showing in the system!”

Me: “Can I see your receipt? I’ll try to find where the money went.”

Customer: “No! You’ll tear it up!”

Me: “There are several people in the office. Do you really think I’d tear it up in front of all of them?”

I took the receipt. The money was applied correctly… except it was to his son’s account. It took some time to figure it out. His son had insurance with our agency, and he had insurance with the other agent. They had similar first names and the same address, so my bad. I apologized and called to have the money moved over and I showed him what happened.

Not the end.

He called the police on me for stealing his money… and sat outside until they came… and they laughed at him.