On Friday, June 27, LYNX Services LLC filed a legal complaint against State Farm, Safelite Group, and Safelite Solutions LLC. LYNX also asked the Court to temporarily stop the change in third-party administrators from going forward on July 1.
Though the complaint was filed with a request to the Court that it be sealed and out of public view, it is believed to accuse State Farm of disclosing, and Safelite of using, LYNX trade secrets and confidential information.
LYNX Services is also requesting that the U.S. District Court for the Central Division of Illinois issue an order against State Farm, Safelite Group Inc. (SGI) and Safelite Solutions LLC (SSL) that orders:
- SGI and SSL to stop using LYNX’s confidential information;
- State Farm to stop disclosing LYNX trade secrets and confidential information to other parties including Safelite;
- SGI and SSL to certify the destruction of these materials, and to issue a
- Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) that prevents Safelite from taking over as the third-party administrator for State Farm’s glass claims on July 1.
LYNX alleges that the defendants are using its service provider lists, service area data, pricing strategy and methodology and other highly confidential business strategies.
“Defendants’ acts of misappropriation erase LYNX’s unique ability to provide competitive benefits of METRYX to its insurance customers based on the use of LYNX’s logic and collection of high-quality data,” says the LYNX request for the Temporary Restraining Order.
A emergency hearing is expected to be held Monday, June 30. Check back to glassBYTES.com™ for more information as it is available.
I wonder why at the last minute this was filed unless Lynx was trying another avenue first. Not sure if Lynx was floating SF on payment and the credit rating drop of SF and Lynx (Got upset because ap was behind) was hand in hand. Was Lynx contract due for renewal? Without this information it is very hard for us to surmise what has transpired. I believe that regardless of how/why Lynx was dropped there should have been a bid process. Also where is the FTC probe into SGC???? Administration of claims should be done by a disinterested party, would be curious to see how SGC structured the pricing agreement for managing the claims as a TPA, I can assume they undercut Lynx on this area and some corporate bean counter at SF looked at it on surface value of that it was going to save SF millions of dollars, while SGC is able to profit off the claim tremendously especially if they get the job over to Safelite. (Claim Assignment SGC Network, Work by Safelite, Profit on the Glass from Service, Profit for paying claim SGC Network)
I have said this for years if I had a bunch of people answering phones masquerading as the insurance company you can make a bet that I would have them do everything in their power to get us to do the work. This is not right in the least. TPAS should be disinterested and better yet insurance carriers need to take claims back in house.
It’s truly amazing that State Farm would even think about SAFELITE!! The Federal Trade Commission should take a good look into the Collusion, Unfair business practices, and Monopoly Safelite has been using with help from the Insurance Companies to destroy the small Independent Glass Shops. George Meherle and the Ed Rust would never let this happen.
State Farm has always been one of the best
I’ve been saying it is a huge conflict of interest to have Safelite answer the glass claims line while also doing auto glass replacement! So maddening. Then they use scare tactics and coercion to steal jobs for the other glass shops. Definitely needed to be an Ftc probe years ago and now they just corner and bully the whole industry. Customers call in a glass claim thinking they’re speaking to the insurance company and the “insurance company” tells them they shouldn’t use the requested companybl because they don’t know them and can’t guarantee their work, scaring them into going through Safelite instead. This is the truth, I have dealt with them for almost 20 years and they’ve always been that way.
Completely agree with what you said, I have been in Auto Glass Business since the 80s, have owned and operated my business for over 25 years. The FTC should have been closely watching SGC for years. And you are correct, I have had on numerous occasions, especially back when the insured had to do a three way call with the shop they choose and the network, tell the insured that if the shop they choose does the work they, SGC can not warranty the work. I remember asking the insured while we were all on the line, “if you have a problem, which you will not, are you going to call me directly or call into this massive call center and not know who your speaking with? Insured replied, I will call you……end of conversation.