It is my understanding that State Farm will now pay non O and A shops directly, IF:

1. They set up a claim through Lynx
2. They agree to the prices (based on where the job is done).
3. The customer agrees that the check can be sent directly to the shop.

For us, this may be an improvement over the current situation, where they pay the customer directly, at the rate according to the customer's home address. At least we'll get somewhat timely payments, hopefully.

This just started less than a week ago.

Yes because in Arizona we took them to court for failure to reconize the assignment and when the new they would loose that they paid us direct but Lynx still used the old speech and with pressure from us and our attorney i believe we helped change things. How would they defend themselves in court we had hundreds of tapes with them misleading customers as well as bombarding them with paper invoices.

In Mn State farm HAS to pay the shop directly. We DID NOT sign up on METRYX. Now with the customers that want to use our shop, we have to accept the network rate, which is not great but workable, then state farm sends us the check straight out.It's paperless, we don't even send them a bill. they cut the check from what they call,"our bottom line bid", but really it's thier pricing we have to accept or we don't get the job! I have heard there are a few shops getting paid a bit better than the farm's rates, but I bet they have to fight for the jobs and getting paid. We have noticed it started out we were getting paid -5-7 days. The last few have been taking 10-15 days,hmmm. The best I've seen is Auto owners and Northstar ins, we see checks from them in as little as 4 days! A few co's are a joy to work with! I think if the customer not only agrees but INSISTS that the check go to the shop doing the work, the Farm would have no choice but to pay the shop!

Don't get pulled in to taking S.F. rates for ease of payment unless you are happy with rates. If you're not happy, this is the time to go for a major change and don't take second choice. Think back, the only place the glass companies situation is going is down hill.

Another problem,if you are not on network and accept,we had one and they sent check to customer in their name only.If they cash good luck,our customer was good enough to call and bring check.Not always that lucky.

Here we go again!!! In MN, State Farm has just changed thier policy,, AGAIN! We just got a St Farm customer, now LYNX has changed thier script. Now we don't give them the "bottom line bid". We must give them the same rate as o&a and the csr said to fax it to lynx. I asked if they are going to try to charge a 7.50 fee, he said no, but I wonder,,, hmmm! If they are we have to bill it back on the invoice. These blood suckers are just trying everything to make working with them nearly impossible. Lynx probably didn't like that we were getting paid in a week or so. They had to figure a way to use our funds even though we are Not on the O&A. What a crock! Now we will probably have to fight to get paid,,, AGAIN!

If you are going to have a hassel anyway, bill it through neon. It's 10 times easier and you deal with class people that are on your side.

J please explain how your process works with Neon. I have seen many post about neon but no one seems to explain the details. Please let me know so i better understand how you do it. What do they charge you? Thanks for your info.

Jim-call 402-223-4700. It's better if you talk to the company. Sorry to take so long to get back.

Just wondering what everyone has against state farm , beside taking so long to pay. Actually they are our best paying customers. If you want to rag on insurance companies lets try farmers,allstae and geico. Oops forgot csaa. Would love to hear some feed back on this post

Explain how SF paying you instead of the customer now is a bad thing. It's a freakin' improvement!

Some folks just aren't happy unless they're whining about the big, bad, insurance company!

The downside is that you have to agree to their rates, so you won't be able to come back later and sue them for short pays.

State Farm direct pay was working good for shops in MN. We got a check in 5 days. Now we are seeing 2 weeks to get paid. We just did a couple ST. Farm jobs an now they have changed the rules again. Now we will have to see if we get paid through LYNX or straight from the farm. And I wonder if they are going to slow pay and we wait for a month or two! Then lynx will probably hit us up for a proccessing fee, cause we are not on thier program. By the way wsr, this is not whinning just stating the facts. For us this may NOT be an improvement. I have seen very little in the way of improvement from tpa's and ins. co's. The part that gets me is ST.Farm keeps changing the rules to suit them and no one else. Just wait, they will be changing pricing again, and, how many believe it will get better?

I'm old enough to remember what ins co. started the current price mess. This isn't whining, it's fact.

Just because SF is the "best of the worst" doesn't make it good. The only decent SF rate is their rural rate at 42% above and $120 flat. The other rates don't pay the bills around here, anyway.

here in rural Wyoming we sure don't get 42% above more like 12% we are a D-market, does anyone else get 42% above? if you do I would like to know, doesn't get much more rural than wyoming

+Well i hate to say this but i do get +42 120. flat and 20 for kit. that's 3 times better than csaa. we are now billing directly through csaa to get sf rates

and not safelite

csaa who are they?

CSAA is Calif. State Auto Association. They are not only in California, however. We see about 1 a month.

My thing is we are over looking something,think about it.If csaa and NEON can bill direct at fair and reasonable why cant we.We got complacent with the networks and NAGS and we got taken,our fault.We got used to easy.We need to take back our bussiness.If they can get it why cant we.We have been in this a lot longer,lets work together to do whats right.

"Kaye, you're right! We shouldn't wait around for some network to do what is right. We should all just bill direct like the IGA wanted to do years ago. We should all start billing with edirectglass using the internet. That's a tool that could save the replacement industry. We just need to get organized, that's all."

Lynne K

One question:

How exactly does E Direct get fair payment aside from the network dictated rates using the totally flawed NAGS model?

And how did E Direct gain this "access" to do so?

I'm interested in the answers. Been billing direct for years, and I'd like to know how this works.

Honey, if you look at it, all the pricing information is used against us by the networks. Lynx and Safelite have everyone's billing information: Price and Location (zipcode). If everyone used one system to collect realistic pricing information (like yourself) then the pricing model could change. We may have to go through the legal system to win but we wouldn't be empty handed like now. The only proof is NAGS and the networks. What's the biggest sacrifice you would have to make? Change systems and find some leaders that will make a commitment to a different approach.

I read about HMO's in Texas (my niece does medical billing for 3 large medical practices) being sued by the providers. They prevailed by collecting their billing info. and the countless rejections for pricing they proved was reasonable. There were so many submissions that the HMO's couldn't use the "You're the only one" routine.

I have read most of your posts and you seem like a smart guy, Mark. You should quit pretending like you can't think "out of the box". If you won't concede that a different approach and a new tool (like using the web to collect realistic pricing) is necessary, then you really need to admit that you don't understand the power of the Internet.

My boss (3 successful stores) thinks that most glass people have a hard time understanding the options available to them. He says the pressure of running a glass shop in today's competitive market is the worst he's seen in 22 years. We are all set on lean and mean and a fallout is near for a large number of shops. There; that's my week's worth of venting.

we have edirect, and I get just as many rejects. plus I get charged if it gets rejected too many times. we try to fix and still. I have emailed edirect and still have not got the answer. so I would like to know how to do it better. edirect is suppose to correct things before it gets rejected, well, I have had more rejects in the last month with them. Better way of billing using the internet and not use their pricing, sure would like to see it and hear how.