SACRAMENTO, California — California’s Insurance Department announced Thursday that it has widened its investigation into State Farm’s handling of insurance claims following the Los Angeles fires.
What happened: The insurance regulator has started a formal market conduct examination into State Farm, the state’s largest property insurer, which is handling record losses from the Palisades and Eaton wildfires in January.
Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara in a release listed some “troubling patterns” his staff will investigate, including “the frequent reassignment of multiple adjusters with little continuity in communication, inconsistent management of similar claims, and inadequate record-keeping or information-sharing among claims teams.”
State Farm said it would cooperate with the investigation. “A fair review will find that thousands of State Farm customers are being helped by our teams on the ground in Los Angeles County and are very satisfied,” the company said in an unattributed statement.
