Mercury ranked fifth in the 2024 Insure.com Best Regional Car Insurance Companies rankings. The insurer received high marks for customer satisfaction, and 84% of customers said they would recommend Mercury to others.
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Mercury ranked fifth in Insure.com’s 2024 list of the Best Regional Car Insurance Companies, scoring 3.6 stars out of 5.
Mercury Insurance is among the top 15 auto insurance companies. Customers noted its high renewal rate and said they’d recommend the company to family members and friends. Mercury Insurance also received an A credit rating for financial stability from AM Best.
Below is Insure.com’s review of the company. It’s based on third-party metrics and an in-depth survey of insurance customers. Find the full methodology here, including an explanation of our survey scores.
AM Best's Financial Strength Rating is an independent opinion of an insurer's financial strength and ability to meet its ongoing insurance policy and contract obligations.
Mercury Insurance has some of the higher premiums of the companies we ranked at a monthly rate of $193. This is $70 more expensive than the most affordable insurer on the list, Erie. The most expensive insurer in our ranking is CSAA Insurance Group, with an average monthly premium of $217.
When asked to rate it for customer satisfaction, 68% of Mercury Insurance customers said they were satisfied with the company’s service overall. Erie has the highest-ranked insurer with a 90% satisfaction rate.
Seventy-four percent of Mercury Insurance and Nationwide customers said they were satisfied with how easy it is to access policy documents and services. Erie and State Farm had the most satisfied customers at 90% and 86%, respectively.
When it comes to policy offerings, 74% of Mercury Insurance and Auto-Owners respondents said they were satisfied with the companies’ policy offerings. Erie led this category, with 88% of its customers giving it high marks.
Eighty-four percent of Mercury’s customers said they would recommend its services. The highest-ranked company is Erie, with 100% of its customers stating they would recommend it to others.
Three-quarters of Mercury’s customers said they trust the company. The top-ranking insurers in the survey include Erie and State Farm.
Mercury Insurance is one of the top-ranking insurers in this category, coming in second place with 95% of its customers saying they would re-sign with the company. It tied for second with Auto Club of Southern California. They both fall slightly behind Erie’s 100% rating.
Seventy-percent of customers were satisfied with how Mercury Insurance handled claims after an accident or vehicle incident. Allstate ranked first.
Mercury Insurance didn’t rank highly for digital/online experience, but no insurers did particularly well in this category. Customers rated insurers based on the ease and convenience of locating necessary information, phone numbers and policy details online. Geico topped the category, with 64% of its customers giving it a good grade.
Mercury fell in the middle here. Sixty-three percent of its customers gave the company a high score for its discounts. The Auto Club of Southern California was the top company for discounts.
When customers bundle their auto, home and life policies, they often save on their overall premium. Forty-seven percent of customers gave the company good marks or its bundling discount. Erie led the category.
George Joseph founded Mercury Insurance in 1962 to offer quality insurance products at affordable rates. The company began with six team members and 90 agents. In 1972, Mercury Insurance began selling homeowners insurance. It began to grow its services and now offers products in 11 states.
Mercury Insurance. “Auto insurance.” Accessed February 2024.
Mercury Insurance. “Discounts.” Accessed February 2024.
Insure.com in the fall of 2023 surveyed more than 1,750 insurance consumers (1,459 people with auto insurance). Online market research company Slice MR conducted the survey. Respondents were asked to name their auto insurer and then grade it in the following categories – customer satisfaction, ease of service and policy offerings. The percentage of respondents who said they were satisfied or very satisfied with their insurer is presented in the results.
Respondents were then asked to pick their insurer’s top three attributes out of more than a dozen presented – trustworthiness, claims satisfaction, digital experience, discounts and best for auto/home bundling. The responses for each attribute were totaled and then divided by the number of each company’s customers who responded to that survey question to create a percentage.
Respondents were then asked if they would recommend their auto insurer to someone else and whether they would renew with their company. The percentage who said yes is presented in the results.
Finally, respondents were given the statement “I trust my insurance company” and asked if they strongly agreed, agreed, disagreed or strongly disagreed with the statement. The percentage of those who said they agreed or strongly agreed is presented in the results.
The editors compiled the survey results and then selected – based on the number of survey responses – the top companies for further evaluation.
They then collected AM Best data, which measures financial strength, and National Association of Insurance Commissioners’ complaint data, which ranks a company by the number of customer complaints it receives. The Insure.com team identified the NAIC company code or codes that were the primary underwriting companies for each carrier and line of business using total annual premiums. The associated NAIC complaint index score was used in the calculations. If more than one underwriting company was identified for a line, the editors used a weighted average of the NAIC complaint index scores.
In addition, we also created star rankings for each company. Respondents were asked to pick their insurer’s top three attributes out of the more than the dozen presented, again including customer satisfaction and policy offerings. The number of responses for each attribute was totaled and then divided by the number of each company’s customers who responded to that survey question to create the star ranking.
The editors also collected insurance rate data from Quadrant Information Services.
With the help of Prof. David Marlett, Ph.D., Managing Director of the Brantley Risk and Insurance Center at Appalachian State University, the editors created a rating system to determine which insurance companies were best in each sector. For auto insurers, we took the following and gave each a weight.
Each insurer was awarded from half a star to 5 stars. No insurer in our star ranking received less than half a star and 5 stars was the most any insurer could receive.