Last reviewed: 1 October 2026

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How to use the NAIC Consumer Insurance Search to research an insurer's complaints

The short answer: the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) says its Consumer Insurance Search lets you look up information on an insurance company by state, company and type of insurance, including the company's complaints, financial condition and how long it has been in business, for the past three years.^[1] It is a company-level tool. It does not search for an individual agent, and NAIC says not to decide on any single factor.^[1]

Why it matters

NAIC says it compiles closed, confirmed complaint information about insurance carriers from state insurance departments.^[1] That is useful background on the company behind a policy. It is not a check on the agent who sold it: for the agent, use your state's license lookup (see our general licensing guide). Our explainer on the NAIC Complaint Index covers the carrier-versus-agent point in more detail and does not interpret any particular score; neither does this page.

Sources

This guide draws on NAIC's consumer article on researching complaints, the Consumer Insurance Search results and report-options pages, NAIC's complaint-report pages and its auto insurance consumer guide, all checked on 1 October 2026. It describes what NAIC says each page covers; it does not report any company's record. The NAIC article is dated 1 September 2022.^[1]

Step 1: find the exact company name on your policy

NAIC's search-results page warns that an insurance company may have different subsidiaries with different names and says to check your policy for the correct name.^[2]

Step 2: search by state, company and type of insurance

NAIC says you can look up information by state, company and insurance type for the past three years.^[1] If you cannot find a company in the search, NAIC says to contact the insurance department where you live.^[2]

Step 3: see the report options NAIC lists

For more refined company-specific reports, NAIC's results page points to a "Click for Report Options" link beside each company result. The page lists five options: Results by Complaint Code, Results by State, Results by Complaint Index, Results by Financial, and Results by Licensing.^[3] The names above are what NAIC's page says; open the reports themselves to see what each contains, and read NAIC's own explanation of any figure rather than a summary from us or a comparison site.

Step 4: use the complaint reports for context

NAIC says it combines data submitted by state insurance departments into reports on common closed complaints by reason and by type of insurance, and on how the complaints were resolved.^[4] Its reason report shows the reasons with the most closed, confirmed complaints by number and percentage,^[4] and its type report does the same for types of coverage.^[5] Its disposition report covers how complaints were resolved.^[5] These are market-wide summaries, useful for seeing what people complain about, not a verdict on any one company.

Step 5: compare several companies, not one

NAIC says you should not use just one factor to decide which insurance company to use, and should compare the complaints, financials and direct premiums written of several companies.^[1] It also says a company's complaint index can vary not only because of changes in that company's own complaints or premiums but because of changes in the complaints or premiums of the U.S. market for that type of insurance.^[1] NAIC's auto insurance guide describes a complaint index this way: it "measures how many complaints your state insurance department receives relative to the size of the company."^[6]

Step 6: confirm the company is licensed in your state

NAIC's results page encourages you to check your state's insurance department website to confirm that the company is licensed, and to learn about other companies licensed in your state.^[2] NAIC's auto guide adds that it is illegal for unlicensed insurance companies or agents to sell insurance, and that business cards and websites are not proof that an agent is licensed.^[6] For the agent, see the state guides below.

The search at a glance

What the search does not tell you

It does not tell you whether the agent in front of you is licensed, appointed with that company, or has a disciplinary record; those are separate checks with their own tools (see how to verify an appointment and how to search a disciplinary record). It also does not tell you whether a policy suits your situation. Several states publish their own company-complaint tools with their own definitions: California describes a study of justified complaints per 100,000 policies,^[7] and Pennsylvania a comparison tool by year and line of business.^[8] See our guides for California and Pennsylvania; each source defines its own measure, so read the definition before comparing numbers.

If something looks wrong

NAIC says to file a complaint with your state department of insurance, starting from its consumer page, selecting your state and following the link to that state's complaint page; it says to have your name, address, type of insurance and the reason for the complaint ready, to gather supporting documents and photographs, to include emails and a log of phone calls with your agent or company, and to write a detailed account of what happened.^[1] Our complaint guide covers the same ground for a complaint about an agent.

State-by-state license checks

To check the agent, use your state's own tool: Texas, New York, Florida, California and Pennsylvania. For other states, start with the general guide.

When we will update this page

We re-read this page when NAIC changes the Consumer Insurance Search, its report options or its complaint-report pages. If something here is out of date, tell us; corrections are dated on the page.

References

1. [1] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, "How to File a Complaint and Research Complaints Against Insurance Carriers" (1 September 2022), read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/article/how-file-complaint-and-research-complaints-against-insurance-carriers
2. [2] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, Consumer Insurance Search results page, read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/cis_consumer_information.htm
3. [3] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, Consumer Insurance Refined Search Results (report options), read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/cis_refined_results.htm
4. [4] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, "Closed Confirmed Consumer Complaints by Reason", read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/cis_agg_reason.htm
5. [5] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, "Closed Confirmed Consumer Complaints by Coverage Type", read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/cis_agg_type.htm
6. [6] National Association of Insurance Commissioners, "A Consumer's Guide to Auto Insurance", read 1 October 2026 — content.naic.org/sites/default/files/publication-aut-pp-consumer-auto.pdf
7. [7] California Department of Insurance, "Consumer Complaint Study", read 1 October 2026 — www.insurance.ca.gov/01-consumers/120-company/03-concmplt/
8. [8] Pennsylvania Insurance Department, "Complaint Comparison Tool", read 1 October 2026 — www.pid.pa.gov/scrpts/cmpln_tool