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CWHTRAINS · 01-29-2017, 08:33 PM

Saw this in one of my insurance news feeds. If you are insured by the RLI company, it appears that you will need to look for a new provider as you near your renewal date.

Friday, January 27, 2017:

Four years after it opportunistically launched a recreational vehicle insurance program, RLI Corp. confirmed Jan. 26 that it is exiting the market.

"We began nonrenewing our RV business, which has struggled to find any level of profitability over the last four years," RLI President and COO Craig Kliethermes said during a conference call. He later added that RLI also was challenged in bringing the business to scale.

Kliethermes' comments were consistent with the explanation provided by RLI Insurance Co. in its notice of withdrawal to Georgia regulators.

RLI indicated in the filing that it would immediately discontinue writing RV business, and its withdrawal would be complete in one year as the company intended to submit nonrenewal notices to its policyholders.

RLI offered the program through Recreation Insurance Specialists LLC, a firm that also maintains agency appointments with a roster of carriers that includes units of Progressive Corp., National General Holdings Corp., American Family Mutual Insurance Co. SI, American Modern Insurance Group Inc., and Farmers Insurance Group of Cos.

Kliethermes said the same environmental factors that have been pressuring industrywide auto insurance profitability may have negatively impacted RLI's RV business.

"We threw the kitchen sink at trying to fix it over the last three or four years," he explained. Kliethermes downplayed the notion that an elevated level of catastrophe losses in 2016 from disasters such as the Louisiana floods contributed to the decision to exit.

theroc · 01-30-2017, 08:26 PM

Interesting. I was wondering why Blue Sky was no longer accepting new applicants on its website. I was figuring this was about to happen.

It's too bad as I was actually getting more impressed with Blue Sky's service. I said in another thread that they used to only deal with customers through the agency that wrote the policy if there were billing questions or service requests. Recently, they allowed us to deal directly with them if needing service.

Blue Sky was pretty popular at one time when they first started offering RV policies. Then they started to raise their rates precipitously in recent years where they are now way above the competition.

It's too bad. I'll miss Blue Sky as we've been with them for over five years now.

Thanks for posting this information.

4x4dually · 02-21-2017, 05:58 AM

Got my non-renewal notice. Where do we go now? Any suggestions?

MisterT · 02-21-2017, 06:01 AM

I got my BlueSky RLI non-renewal toward the end of last year and switched to SAFECO, which, fortunately, had re-entered the RV market in Georgia. As a Safeco agent/agency owner, it's nice to have my OWN motor coach insurance through a company I represent!

barmcd · 02-21-2017, 06:30 AM

We have Safeco insurance on our coach. Outstanding company with good service.

theroc · 02-21-2017, 12:15 PM

Our Blue Sky policy expires toward the end of the year. Since we have special circumstances that only a few carriers cover correctly, we are limited in choices.

I'll definitely start checking out Safeco to see if they are compatible but I have doubts. Being a Seattle native, I'm partial to Safeco but knew they always had high rates. Now that they are part of Liberty Mutual, I keep hearing that they are much more competitive with their rates.