Garden State Goodfellas: The Five Insurance Families of New Jersey

by Alana Quartuccio

Let’s be honest here. It’s really not a secret. One can only keep their head down for so long.

Body shops in every corner of the state can likely attest to having encountered the seedy underworld that out on the streets is more commonly referred to as the insurance industry.

How some of these organizations handle auto damage insurance claims is no short of a racket, literally. In fact, all too often these actions resemble acts of organized crime. [Insert knuckle cracking sound here]

Not every insurance company operates in ways that make body shop owners want to close their blinds and hide, but those that do, leave many feeling like they are a dead man walking.

Collision repair professionals are the experts. Only they know how to properly and safely fix vehicles. Meanwhile, these insurers send in their goodfellas to do their dirty deeds. They go to great lengths to shakedown repair plans and fail to negotiate or acknowledge fair and reasonable labor rates. These are not “offers you can’t refuse.” It’s quite the opposite in fact. These “capos” are there to muscle in as much earnings as possible for their “boss” causing a racket that victimizes civilians, aka the vehicle owner who has to foot the bill or drive an unsafe car, and the shops, who many times have to eat the cost just for the sake of doing things right.

“It feels like racketeering,” a longtime shop owner notes. “When you look at how insurance companies try to shake people down. They offer them what is supposed to be protection but when the time comes, they wind up in concrete shoes.”

New Jersey Automotive is the eyes and ears of the collision repair industry in the Garden State. We listen closely to our readers who have shared their many horror stories with our editorial team, leading us to identify the five insurers who take on the “syndicate” identity the most.

Progressive

Their motto may be, “Think easier, think Progressive,” but from what shops are telling us, this national insurance company may very well be the Boss of Bosses of insurance companies.

In New Jersey Automotive’s annual Industry Survey published every December, readers have identified Progressive as one of their most difficult insurers to deal with for the past nine years in a row. In 2025, 68 percent of readers pointed their fingers at Progressive for their ill-informed decisions and backward actions. Hard feelings are shared nationally too as CRASH Network’s 2026 Insurance Report Card respondents ranked Progressive at number 73 out of 91 insurers.

Here’s a company that brings in roughly $11 billion in revenue per year and paid its CEO, Susan Patricia Griffith, roughly $16.3 million in 2024, but will short change a New Jersey vehicle owner by $1,500 insisting their repair shop’s labor rate was “too high.”  “Progressive – or maybe they should be called ’Aggressive’? – kept insisting the amount of the repair was too high even when I offered to waive storage fees, and reduce my hourly rate,” according to the shop owner. The vehicle owner offered to save the insurer money on their rental car, yet still refused to pay any more than they offered.

Sometimes, in order to fight these dirty deeds, one needs to bring in the authorities. In this case, the vehicle owner took the insurance giant to court and won!  The judge decided that Progressive failed to negotiate, ordering the insurer to pay the consumer the difference.

When it comes to paying for storage? Fuggedaboutit, says a veteran repair professional. “For some reason, they don’t have an appraiser in my area so they have to dispatch people from elsewhere in New Jersey… the cars just sit here for days. I have one here now waiting for 10 days. Last month, I had a car sitting on my lot for 29 days before they looked at it. Of course, it became a total. It wound up amounting to 46 days of storage. Then they complain about the storage bill and try to push it on the vehicle owner. The whole reason it sat there for so long is because of them.”

“I don’t understand where the disconnect is,” says another collision repairer. “I had a sideswiped pickup truck in here with damage on the fender and the door. He wrote four hours for the door and one hour on the fender but the fender clearly was in worse condition and should have in fact been double the amount of time he wrote for the door.”

When it comes to the crime of underindemnification, they are habitual offenders.

“They prey on the weak and poor,” observes a north Jersey shop owner. “They all do, but Progressive really seems to pick on the policyholders who are less educated and have less money. They use this to convince their clients that the shop who charges $10,000 is the bad guy so they can steer them toward one of their own guys who will do it for $4,000.”

Consumers really are at their mercy. “They act like a puppet master pulling strings and determining outcomes without any legal standings,” one shop owner observes of Progressive’s “soldiers” – who will write aftermarket to replace parts on brand new vehicles. It’s the appraiser who ultimately is their button man.

Another shop owner told New Jersey Automotive that Progressive went out of their way to fight the replacement of high-strength steel in a vehicle despite multiple professional opinions. “They called two of their DRPs and both agreed that the steel needed to be replaced. We said the steel has to be replaced. The appraiser was forced to call in a third DRP and those knuckleheads agreed to repair instead. It has nothing to do with fixing the car right.”

Progressive removed the Right to Appraisal from their policies and many shop owners complain they refuse to address anything related to cars not being properly repaired. “They’ll taunt you. They’ll basically say ‘go ahead and sue us; we don’t care.”

State Farm

Right up there with Progressive, New Jersey shop owners cite State Farm as anything but a “good neighbor.” According to one north Jersey shop owner, they have all the characteristics of the waste management business, so to speak.

“State Farm sucks garbage,” he says of one of the country’s largest insurance enterprises. In fact, his company just refuses to deal with them at all. “We tell our customers who have State Farm insurance to deal with them directly, because we won’t get involved.”

Readers who took New Jersey Automotive’s Industry Survey also listed State Farm at the top of their list of most difficult insurers. The feelings against this insurance clan are felt far and wide in the industry; CRASH Network’s 2026 Insurance Report card ranks State Farm even lower than Progressive at 85 out of 91 insurance companies rated. Their recent actions even inspired one repairer to speak out against the company at the most recent Collision Industry Conference for engaging in practices like reducing labor rates across the country and utilizing a centralized claims review process, ultimately affecting shops and, more importantly, consumers nationwide.

“State Farm is just God awful,” insists the head of a central Jersey shop. “They offer no recourse. They removed the Right to Appraisal from their policy. Generally, they only pay 20 to 30 percent of a total repair bill and basically tell their customers to go scratch.”

“They will only do what they want,” reports one shop owner. “They basically slash the bill right in half. They’ll look for the most inexpensive or rebuilt part and base their reimbursement on that.”

“State Farm comes in like they’re your best friend,” shares one collision repairer. “They’ll lie and tell stories to the policyholder that they inspected the vehicle and they don’t even come out.”

“They write what they want and there is no discussion,” laments another. “The customer has no leg to stand on.”

One shop owner straight out believes these actions are somewhat criminal. This shop owner had a new high-end vehicle in his shop in need of a new headlight with a $5,000 price tag. “They refused and refused. It took six months to get this resolved and in the end they shortpaid the claim and the customer had to go out of pocket.”

State Farm doesn’t play any favorites in who they go after. As one shop owner reports, they’ve even told a little old lady who had a $18,000 claim to basically “go sleep with the fishes.”

Allstate

Garden State collision repairers can attest that one is not exactly “in good hands” with Allstate. In fact, they’re more likely to tell customers to steer clear as they very likely could find themselves involved in a set up.

Allstate falls in line with State Farm and Progressive as the top three most difficult to deal with insurance companies based on New Jersey Automotive’s annual Industry survey, and ranks number 84 on CRASH Network’s 2026 Insurance Report Card. One of the largest insurance companies in the nation (which also took in $67.5 billion in revenue last year) is well-known for their lack of negotiation skills and for leaving policyholders out to dry.

According to a northern Jersey shop, Allstate took zero responsibility for a claim that cost a vehicle owner roughly $25,000 out of pocket in storage because they refused to communicate. “The customer’s brand new Volkswagen was hit in a parking lot. She and the responsible party both had Allstate insurance. We put it on our lift so they could come observe it. It took them 10 days before they even told us it was a total loss, so for 10 days they let it sit there accumulating close to $7,000 in charges.” Allstate refused the charges, pushing it all back on the customer and the shop, when it was their delay that racked up the bill. “They built up the charges and then they told the client to go kick rocks.”

According to one owner, “Allstate just doesn’t care. Typically, they will come back with a supplement that’s 30 or 40 percent of the proposed repair plan. Customers are stuck having to invoke RTA or pay the difference.”

It makes you wonder what type of Omertà oath some of their appraisers are forced to take, as many shops point to the cluelessness of most who walk in the door.

“We have an Allstate appraiser who comes in who we literally refer to as Joey Moron,” laughs one shop owner. “He doesn’t know the first thing about fixing cars.”

One central Jersey collision repairer couldn’t believe that an appraiser wrote $2,000 on an Audi job that he estimated to be $27,000. “The vehicle was severely crushed in the back. A blind man could have seen that this was a total loss.”

Even the vehicle owner agreed that there was no way the repairs could only amount to $2,000, he says. “How do you compare $2,000 with $27,000? It’s not even within the realm of rationale! There is nothing you can say or do to justify this type of behavior.”

“They look to shortchange everywhere,” says another. “And they literally tie you down with additional administrative work.”

“Allstate is trying to do anything they can to keep a corrective repair out of my facility,” shares a South Jersey repairer. “The vehicle owner has been back to the shop who originally worked on it five times! Allstate ensues fear and intimidation to get what they want, and they want to hide all the sins from a professional like myself, who will call them out on it.”

NJM

Woke up this morning

Got a blue moon in your eyes…

Cue the theme song, here comes New Jersey’s very own “Sopranos” family! The state’s very own New Jersey Manufacturers (NJM) clearly makes the list. This regional insurer, based in Parsippany, is high on the list of contention for most New Jersey shop owners.

“They run like the mob. Like the rules don’t apply to them,” says a north Jersey shop owner.

“New Jersey Manufacturers rears their ugly head,” said another.

Some admit being fearful of NJM. Their dealings have led to court appearances if put on NJM’s hitlist. Many believe them to be well connected with the powers that be in the state, which could mean things won’t always bode well for the consumer or the body shop.

Several years back, a few body shops teamed up to take legal action against NJM alleging the insurer violated the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization (RICO) act, the Consumer Fraud Act (CFA) and the New Jersey Antitrust act (NJAA).

“They seem to be well-rooted in the state’s judicial and political system,” one collision repairer observes. “It’s concerning. It seems as though things always rule in their favor or they act as though they are above the law. Someone once told me they sit in the country club with the powers that be. So if you want to go after NJM, be ready because they will string you out to death.” 

“NJM comes in and tells you what they are going to pay. There is zero negotiation,” shouts one Hunterdon county shop owner. “They insist they will only pay what they will pay their DRP shops. I have a vehicle in my shop right now that I have to fix upfront and they won’t pay the extra expenses claiming that those costs aren’t what their DRP shop charged. These vehicles wind up underrepaired and underwritten when they do that. They refuse to pay to fix these vehicles properly.”

One shop owner says it’s not all jobs, as NJM will come in and negotiate some, but with others they will just put their foot down and outright refuse: “They look at it from the perspective of how cheap they can get it done for. There is no concern for the safety of vehicle occupants by having it fixed correctly.”

Liberty Mutual

Last but not least, Liberty Mutual is another major insurance company most commonly groaned about when Garden State shops are asked which insurers make their “most wanted” list. On a national scale, Liberty Mutual fell right in line with Allstate and State Farm, coming in at the bottom of the CRASH Network 2026 Insurance Report Card with a ranking of 85 out of 91 insurance companies polled.

This company reportedly had soaring profits in 2025, yet as one repairer puts it: “It’s the same game with these guys. They don’t want to pay.” Undoubtedly, they will come back at 50 percent of what the shop wrote on their estimate, repairers insist.

They’re also known to abandon vehicles.

“They would play this game around total losses, in the past. They would turn it over to the collection agency. Even if someone had an agreement to release the vehicle for a certain amount, they would come after them. That seems to have stopped as of late, but now they just abandon the vehicle here!”

One repairer reports Liberty Mutual stated they’d only pay 30 percent of the bill on a repair and strong-handled that they would pick up the vehicle provided the shop agreed to the charges. “Oh, it doesn’t work like that,” insisted the shop owner, who said the insurer wound up abandoning the car and went dark for weeks. Letters sent to the insurer from attorneys still resulted in Liberty Mutual stating they would only pick up the car if his shop agreed to the terms.

A Morris County collision repairer alluded to Liberty Mutual’s tendency to hide behind the curtain. “They are all online. If they do send someone out, it’s not a fixer; it’s just someone who falls on the sword.”

“They are nasty. The client has to sue them in the end!” another said of their bully-like characteristics.

In one case, they tried to do some spring cleaning on an elderly vehicle owner over her brand new Infiniti which was initially deemed a total loss. “She came into the shop and released the vehicle. Then something weird happened and they changed their minds, saying the car was repairable, but they never even saw an estimate! Meanwhile, our storage charges accrued. This poor lady had no clue what was happening. We wrote $29,000 on this brand new vehicle. They wrote $10,000. These charges were fought for four or five weeks only to total the car – again – in the end. A month and a half of claims denied. They ran this poor lady through the ringer.”

The same shop owner reports that later down the line, Liberty Mutual had the state department of motor vehicles come in to audit the files related to this claim. “We were given a clean bill of health,” he says proudly. “We had no violations. It was a punitive measure by the insurer. It was a hard fight. Two months spent trying to help this poor lady and they tried to paint us out to be the bad guys.”

Well, there you have it. New Jersey’s most infamous insurance families. Do you agree? Who else would you add to this list? Reach out to our Editorial Director Alana Quartuccio at alana@grecopublishing.com and let her know your thoughts.

It seems that the insurance companies in our state follow Robert DeNiro’s credo from the movie Casino: “There are three ways to do things around here: the right way, the wrong way, and the way that I do it.”

The moral of the story is this: The body shop world and the insurance world will likely never really see eye to eye. Insurers especially are looking to “take care of our own.” As for the shops, one owner put it best: “I learned from getting punched in the face too many times, so I try not to get hit.”

Want more? Check out the June 2026 issue of New Jersey Automotive!