Nationwide controversies
Controversies tied to this brand in public sources. A listing is not a finding of fault.
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2015
Controversial Make Safe Happen advertisement
Nationwide’s Super Bowl advertisement portraying a deceased child was widely criticized as morbid and inappropriate for an upbeat sports broadcast. The company maintained that the creative treatment was intended to draw attention to preventable child injuries.
2014
Nationwide receives punitive damages award in bad-faith insurance case
A plaintiff obtained an $18 million punitive damages award after a court case concerning alleged bad-faith handling of an automobile-collision claim.
2014
Bad-faith automobile claim dispute
A plaintiff obtained an $18 million punitive damages award after alleging that Nationwide pressured its policyholder instead of negotiating in good faith over compensation for an automobile-collision loss.
2012
Nationwide reaches settlement over life-insurance death benefits
Nationwide agreed to pay $7.2 million to resolve a multistate insurance-regulatory investigation concerning the use of the Social Security Death Master File in identifying potentially unpaid life-insurance benefits.
2012
Unpaid life-insurance death benefits investigation
Nationwide agreed to pay $7.2 million to resolve a multistate market-conduct investigation into its use of the Social Security Death Master File. The investigation concerned procedures for identifying deceased policyholders and locating beneficiaries who had not submitted claims. The agreement required insurers to compare records against death data and conduct beneficiary searches.