by Allen Williams

Today's insurance market is simply the pits especially where automobile coverage is concerned. Consumer complaints are on the rise and even though one can get a feel for how he or she may fair under insurer policies from these complaints, there is little relief from industry abuses. One such example is Farm Bureau Financial Services of West Des Moines. Iowa, a holding company that has acquired a number of state farm bureaus through the years including Kansas in 2001.

Farm Bureau is a financial conglomerate that provides Home and Auto coverage through its subsidiaries as well as questionable innovative technologies like driveology'. View the FBFS Driver real time monitoring brochure here: (https://www.fbfs.com/insurance/auto-insurance/driveology) Whats that you may ask? Note that the company's safe driving software will be rating YOUR contribution to global warming as a qualifier for premium auto discounts.

We now live in a technological age where government and its affiliated partners can render total information control over every individual. Under real time driver management surveillance, most people will never qualify for any significant discounts. It will be nothing more than an intrusive incursion into ones privacy.

As you might imagine in new technologies, the Farm Bureau website does not give any system details on its driver monitoring package. Their safety brochure mailed to potential insurance renewals is all the information that is available. They want you to talk to their agent where nothing promised is in writing to establish that the insurer wasn't acting in good faith in the event of future litigation. I'll define what that means a bit later.

Now before one can actually qualify for the kind of savings they hint at with their driver monitor (up to 30%) you need to own the right car. What might that be you respond? Well the advertisement I received with last years 13.5% rate increase infers that I may only expect to receive the maximum discounted savings IF my car qualifies. Now given the fact that Farm Bureau raised my auto rates 18% last year with no claims for the last 15 to 20 years that Ive been insured, I have to conclude that one must have the latest vehicle technology in addition to their software if any real savings are possible. So, what must a person do?

Well for starters I must accept their electronic surveillance package in my car (it could be as simple as a flash drive plugged into my cars USB port, if I had one) that would query and store my vehicles health, environmental and operating data.

Expect this to be a points based rating system not unlike trading carbon credits. For example, you just had a new CO exhaust monitor installed in the vehicle, that's +5 points but you also have a substandard performing catalytic converter and that's (-)50 points. Get the drift or am I going too fast?

In addition, the FB insurance system records how often the brake pedal is actuated, your distance traveled, the speed of the vehicle and if the driver is wearing a seat belt. I bet it will also test driver alertness on long trips as most new cars have a camera screen which is perfect for receiving visual messages and alarms from your driving safely monitor. It will send various messages that need to be responded to in a certain amount of time along the lines of a drunk detector on start-up which requires you to type in a random series of numbers in sequence in 10 or so seconds or you can't start the car. Remember, older drivers with arthritis and other physical impairments will be challenged to satisfy such tests. And, it would most likely result in a serious penalty (-)1000 points, etc in the driveology system if you fail it.

The Farm Bureau software surveillance system is capable of virtually infinite expansion as any new WIFI device can communicate with your vehicle WIFI. So say, there is a new device marker for a school zone, the marker will notify the FBFS system in your car enabling it to determine if you're speeding in that region, and if so (-) 100 points. And lets not forget that weather is available across the WIFI network which allows insurers to determine that you're driving too fast on wet slippery roads and then more point penalties. Also, they will know what you' re listening to on the radio and if you are texting because these are all WIFI access devices. And because most fast food restaurants also have WIFI, the company will be aware of what you're eating and drinking. This information will be sold to their business partners per their privacy notification policy.

The Farm Bureau driver monitor will also know the last time your car was serviced and if the environment is being harmed by using the AC too often. [UPDATE] These intrusive measures are being offered as a 'social responsibility' effort but also a 'profit enhancer' for companies. Telogis offers real time driver monitoring.  See (https://www.telogis.com/benefits/social-responsibility)
Here's an example of what's already underway in commercial fleet operation: "Using Telogis Fleet (https://www.telogis.com/solutions/fleet) you can measure progress on green metrics. Using baseline data, ongoing collection and record-keeping of GHG outputs, you can report on your current carbon footprint and track green fleet initiatives. ..It all adds up to shrinking your carbon footprint and minimizing carbon emissions. Calculate your potential CO2 reductions using our GPS ROI calculator."
(https://www.telogis.com/benefits/your-roi/gps-roi)

Driver monitors can also interface with the police license scanner system ALPR - (http://www.theiacp.org/ALPR) alerting an expired license (-)1500 points (plus a ticket). Or perhaps, you did not schedule that emissions test when told to by the system within the time window allotted (-) 500 points. The FB driveology data is viewable externally as their brochure claims but you cant correct it. It will testify against you in any legal proceeding resulting from a citation or an accident.

Now after your car has spied on you for a period of time, I mean monitored your driving habits for a year or so, you become eligible for advanced premium discounts. But I'd be surprised if anyone could qualify for a dime of rebate under such a program, more than likely the FB system will document scores of reasons why one can't earn a premium break and will then be justification for endless rate increases just as one experiences each year for those over retirement age.

Statistics is the lifeblood of the insurance industry; these people are always looking for ways to minimize their risks and boost profits at the drivers expense so your personal freedom and privacy under the 4th amendment is of little concern. So, do not be surprised if the insurance industry is already lobbying government to require this invasive technology under penalty of law. Forcing individuals to upgrade equipment and purchase services they do not need or want is a time honored globalist tradition right along with getting the government to do their dirty work. (If you have forgotten that just revisit Obamacare.)

Companies like Farm Bureau also force you to subscribe to their quarterly Kansas Living magazine as a condition of purchasing their auto insurance. Kansas Living is no longer the voice of agriculture but a paid platform of partner advertising subsidized by the policy holder. You can't cancel it because your FB auto insurance is contingent upon remaining a Kansas Living subscriber.

So, how effective is Farm Bureaus claim management you may think? Well, in short, they almost never return your phone calls. Particularly, if you have a question about their rates do not expect to get an answer in your lifetime. For a supposedly rural company they come off like the snobbish global company they truly are. One recent user named Rachel from Kansas (https://www.consumeraffairs.com/insurance/farm-bureau-homeowners.htm) laments: 

"Extremely dissatisfied with Farm Bureau. We have paid additional to get residential home equipment breakdown coverage. Our heat and air unit outside needs replacement. It has been eleven days since we have filed our claim. We have tried to contact the insurance agent several times. He does not pick up his phone and neither does he answer back."

I certainly have to agree with her assessment based on my personal experiences with Farm Bureau.

Then there is Debra (https://www.consumeraffairs.com/insurance/farm-bureau-homeowners.htm) from the Indiana branch of Farm Bureau:

"I've had Indiana Farm Bureau Insurance for 6 SIX years, paying approx $200/month which equals over $14k and had NO ZERO claims, not even 1 speeding ticket, yet my insurance rates keep increasing - on my 11 yo vehicle! I am even over 50. Called my agent and he said "Well, I can't explain it. Sorry. I'll even shop around for you!"

" Here are more FBFS complaints from the consumer protection website (https://www.consumeraffairs.com/insurance/farm_bureau_auto.html).

Folks there is a reason behind Farm Bureaus rude and callous behavior, they simply don't have to perform because if there is any misdoings you're the one (or your attorney) who has to prove that the insurer was not acting in good faith and its just about impossible to prove given the legal boundary conditions that have to be satisfied simultaneously. Now you know the value of insurance lobbying. Yes, state governments have provided some cushy legal protection for the insurance cartel's deep pockets. Here is an excellent example from Findlaw as to how the claim game is played.

On October 9, 1999, Roger Bellville (Bellville) and his wife, Sue Ellen, were involved in a motor vehicle accident with Guy Schueler. Ellen died at the scene Bellville was unharmed. (http://caselaw.findlaw.com/ia-supreme-court/1256710.html)

Now here's the explanation of 'good faith' in legal terms as I mentioned earlier: 

So bad faith actions ARE NOT proof of bad faith itself and precisely what insurance adjuster actions could ever be deemed unreasonable in a court of law? And how could you prove that the insurer knew or should have known that his basis for denying the claim was unreasonable? Anything the adjuster does will be deemed reasonable; the appellate court has already affirmed that assumption in this particular case.

Farm Bureaus real time driver monitoring system is a privacy threat and a consumer rip off.

by Benjamin Arie

A terrible double standard has been uncovered within the media, and it centers on one of the left’s favorite talking points this month: Underage illegal immigration.

For weeks, the topic has dominated headlines and sparked what seems like coordinated outrage among liberals.

Apparently oblivious to the fact that the Obama administration detained minors at the border for years, the left has pointed fingers instead at President Donald Trump for enforcing regulations that were enacted before he was even president.

Pundits including MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough even compared U.S. law enforcement officials to Nazis, all because they separate children who are brought along during the commission of federal crimes from adults who are being placed into criminal custody.

This is akin to being outraged because police don’t throw the children of suspects in jail with their parents during arrests, but instead take them into protective environments.

The left-leaning media stayed strangely silent when the detention of migrant children went on for years before Trump took office… and now it looks like they also kept quiet when Barack Obama’s administration literally placed immigrant children in the hands of human traffickers just a few years ago.

“The United States government placed an unknown number of Central American migrant children into the custody of human traffickers after neglecting to run the most basic checks on these so-called ‘caregivers,'” New York magazine reported in 2016, based on a Senate report.

Blame Trump! The problem, for the left, however, is that this horrific mistreatment of immigrant children happened in 2013 — right in the middle of the Obama presidency, and two years before Trump even announced he was a candidate.

“In the fall of 2013, tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors traveled to the U.S. southern border,” continued New York magazine.

“At least six of those children were eventually resettled on an egg farm in Marion, Ohio, where their sponsors forced them to work 12 hours a day under threats of death,” the report continued. That’s right: Around the same time that now-infamous pictures of the Obama administration putting migrant children in caged detention areas were being snapped, the same administration was directly responsible for essentially handing foreign kids into child slavery.

“It is intolerable that human trafficking — modern-day slavery — could occur in our own backyard,” Sen. Rob Portman, an Ohio Republican, told The New York Times at the time.

Politics

Report: Obama’s HHS Placed Children With Human Traffickers, Media Dead Silent

By Benjamin Arie
June 17, 2018 at 3:08pm

“At least six of those children were eventually resettled on an egg farm in Marion, Ohio, where their sponsors forced them to work 12 hours a day under threats of death,” the report continued.

That’s right: Around the same time that now-infamous pictures of the Obama administration putting migrant children in caged detention areas were being snapped, the same administration was directly responsible for essentially handing foreign kids into child slavery.

“It is intolerable that human trafficking — modern-day slavery — could occur in our own backyard,” Sen. Rob Portman, an Ohio Republican, told The New York Times at the time.

“But what makes the Marion cases even more alarming is that a U.S. government agency was responsible for delivering some of the victims into the hands of their abusers,” the senator continued.

The Obama administration was appallingly lax at conducting even basic checks about the adults who showed up to “claim” migrant children.

“As detention centers became incapable of housing the massive influx of migrants, the [Obama-run] Department of Health and Human Services started placing children into the care of sponsors who would oversee the minors until their bids for refugee status could be reviewed,” explained New York magazine, again confirming that the detention of child migrants took place long before Trump.

The current administration at least provides comfortable and safe housing for the children who are separated from their parents. Obama’s team did something very different.“ But in many cases, officials failed to confirm whether the adults volunteering for this task were actually relatives or good Samaritans — and not unscrupulous egg farmers or child molesters,” the magazine reported about the Obama-era scandal.

“The department performed check-in visits at caretakers’ homes in only 5 percent of cases between 2013 and 2015,” it continued. “The Senate’s investigation built on an Associated Press report that found more than two dozen unaccompanied children were placed in homes where they were sexually abused, starved, or forced into slave labor.”

Shockingly, nobody knows for certain how many immigrant children ended up in horrific slavery-like circumstances under Obama’s watch. Over 90,000 immigrant children were placed into so-called “sponsor care” during the time-frame of 2013 to 2015.

“Exactly how many of those fell prey to traffickers is unknown, because the agency does not keep track,” New York magazine concluded.

Even after the scandal was uncovered and locations such as the slave-like egg farm in Marion, Ohio, were raided by police, the media remained oddly quiet.

A Google search of this incident reveals only a handful of media outlets covering the story between 2013 and 2014, despite the clearly huge implications of this Obama scandal.

It seems that when immigration enforcement policies made President Obama look bad, they were swept under the rug. Now that the same border problems that have existed for decades can be used against Donald Trump, however, liberal journalists have miraculously found the backbone to cover the story.

The reality is that border and immigration issues are tough, and children are unfortunately caught in the middle.

Just as it’s heartbreaking but necessary for police to make an arrest when children are witnesses, or for Child Protective Services to step in when a family situation turns ugly, the presence of minors doesn’t mean that we stop enforcing national laws. This would only encourage law-breakers to use children as “legal shields” as they commit more crimes.

Reality isn’t always pretty. There are no easy or magic answers on how to enforce U.S. border laws while being humane and compassionate to innocent kids dragged into the chaos by adults. It’s a difficult situation from any angle.

Trump’s administration is doing its best to deal with a problem it inherited from past presidents — but the fact that the mainstream media barely said a word about much worse treatment of migrants should be a giant red flag about the real agenda being pushed by liberal journalists now.

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