The Hartford Reviews

I worked at The Hartford full-time for less than a year

Pros – sometimes there is a good team atmosphere.

Cons – Strict, routine, low pay, no lenience

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at The Hartford full-time for more than a year

Pros – Great coworkers and helpful management make it great.

Cons – Nothing to share at this time

Advice to Senior Management – Keep up the great work.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at The Hartford as an intern for less than a year

Pros – Great people, willing to help and teach

Cons – No free coffee at the office

Advice to Senior Management – Free coffee and water would be welcome at the office.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I worked at The Hartford full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – set hours, decent health care benefits

Cons – poor compensation, management tries to get you to not hit goals so you don't get paid incentives

Advice to Senior Management – Help reach goals, make incentives better

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I worked at The Hartford full-time for more than 8 years

Pros – You get a lot of PTO (vacation time) right from the start. 19 days to start, 24 days after 4 years, 29 days after 10 years. Plus 8 or 9 holidays a year. (However, when I left it was very hard to get the vacation time you wanted, at least during the popular summer months and school vacations).

Ability to work from home full time for some employees (when I left this program was on hold, but some employees were "grandfathered in").

Cons – No flexibility regarding hours worked. (This did not use to be the case, but in the last year or 2 they have decided that phone coverage is of extreme importance. This job has become more and more like a call center. If no one on your team (of 4-6 employees) works until 5:00PM, then you must take turns covering those hours. This means you may work 7:15-4:00 3 or 4 days in a week, and then 8:15-5:00 1 or 2 days a week. However, if you happen to be placed on a team where 1 or even all of your co-workers prefer the 5:00 shift then you don't have to do this. Unfortunately, you have no choice regarding what team you work on, and they re-arrange the teams often. At any time you could be forced to work an inflexible schedule. This was the "last straw" that drove me to leave the company. When I started, no one cared what your hours were, when I started, my boss didn't even know my hours!)

Micro-managing is built into work procedures. (Your supervisor is required to review ALL of your files at least once every 3 months).

Moral in office was very bad when I left, many felt threatened that they would be let go if they didn't consistently meet the very high goals set (even employees that had been there for YEARS).

When I left we were required to have 1 or 2 meeting a week with the director to discuss any files that were not "timely". It could be a humiliating experience, not to mention take time from your work. This was a new thing, we never did this in all the years I worked here before!

Technology is outdated. The system they use to process claims actually hinders your ability to work effectively. They have put off updating it for YEARS.

Advice to Senior Management – Hire superior employees to complete the work properly, train them, let them gain experience, and then LET THEM MANAGE THE CLAIMS. In this scenario there is no need for micro-managing. Superior employees will not stand for the micro-managing and will leave (as they have already).

When I left there were teams of 4-6 employees to 1 manager. The rational was that managers needed to oversee ALL of their employees work. This seems like a waste of money and ineffective use of resources.

Update the claim system! It would reduce errors and make claim handling much easier, more accurate, and more efficient.

I have tried to give a fair, honest review. For the first 5 or 6 years I worked for the company, I was happy. I never thought of looking for another job. I felt respected. It's only the last few years that I began to be dissatisfied. Many changes were made, but I think for the worse. I do feel that in another few years these changes will be found to not work, and will be reversed. But in the meantime, I just couldn't wait it out!

DISCLAIMER: This review is for the Long Term Disability Department (Life), in Syracuse, NY for the year 2012. Hartford is such a huge company that other departments and areas are likely to be vastly different. Hartford makes changes so often that in a few years, this review may be obsolete!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at The Hartford full-time for more than a year

Pros – Really friendly coworkers
Positive environment
Verbal recognition for good work

Cons – Metrics are becoming impossible to meet
Only the top 10% of employees get bonuses, and you're "ranked amongst your peers," which means that there's a 90% chance, that even if you meet the numbers HIG gives you, you still won't get a bonus
Metrics work against you and serve as a deterrent for good work... especially when there's a 90% chance that all the work you're doing won't even be financially recognized

Advice to Senior Management – Stop obsessing about calls answered live and acd calls and focus more on production and CLI.. ... If production and CLI are great, then the former two metrics mentioned shouldn't even matter.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at The Hartford full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Heading in the right direction

Cons – No complaints to provide at this time.

Advice to Senior Management – Keep up the good work, continue to make improvements to make this a better company for both employees and shareholders!!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at The Hartford full-time for more than a year

Pros – Culture, people, collaborative environment, and benefits

Cons – There are really no cons.

Advice to Senior Management – Continue to do what you are doing!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at The Hartford full-time

Pros – The company spends alot of money on its employees and I am very happy there. They are always doing employee engagement activities and it makes the work day go by very quickly. I work with a great group of people and its my home away from home.

Cons – There are few cons for me, I'm trying to be a remote worker and there is a long wait for me. This is the only thing I can think of at the moment. Many companies don't do remote workers at all, so really this is also a pro.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

I have been working at The Hartford full-time for more than a year

Pros – - PTO (19 days for new hires, 40 hours credited almost immediately, and the option to purchase an additional 40 hours of PTO so that's almost 5 weeks!)
- Annual bonus (mines was $1000), compensation for CSR is competitive
- lots of benefits (excluding vision) and company perks/discounts
- very structured organization (has its con as well)
- mgmt/executives keeps you in the loop with organizational changes for the most part (corporate wide emails and townhall meetings)
- remote work opportunities even in the CSR level

Cons – - micromanaging seems to be embedded in the managers and the organization as a whole; you'd think perhaps its only applicable to CSR but even switching depts to Finance for instance, you're still told WHEN you can leave before you're ALLOWED to leave
- raises are meager, $.24 for completing "milestones" with the opportunity to as soon as you're on the floor/start working but it's capped after 2 raises if you don't plan to take the career path in CS and each position requires you to stay a year before posting out internally.
- lots of divisions were sold including Life Insurance and Annuities is going into runoff which resulted in many fearing for their job security and rightfully so bc The Hartford only occupies one/five floor at their Woodbury location.

Advice to Senior Management – Stop micromanaging and learn to trust your subordinates or you will continue to make employees lack job satisfaction which will result in a high turnover, if it isn't already.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend