The U.S.’s second largest personal lines carrier settled a
federal class-action lawsuit in Texas brought by seven minorities who
claimed Allstate’s use of credit scoring discriminated against Hispanics and
African-Americans.[...]Allstate will use a new publicly available scoring method. In states
where it uses information from credit reports to rate policies, it will
provide customers with the chance to have their insurance policies priced
using the new method.The insurer will also offer an appeals program for customers who
experience an extraordinary event - such as a medical emergency - that hurts
their credit. And it will offer education on how to improve credit
scores.
That’s actually a pretty decent result for Allstate. Back when I was a bit
more active in working with insurance scoring, Allstate still seemed stuck
in the last decade in the level of secrecy and hard-lined-ness they seemed
to take with scoring. Openness and working with the consumer to rectify
any problems that are found really are a better strategy to take, I think,
when it comes to insurance scoring.