Did my insurance company give me a BS answer regarding a rate increase?

Was this a BS answer? You seem to have the odd idea that rate increases need to be "fair" or "justified". They don't. Stop concerning yourself with why the rate increase occurred, just that it did. Should I go shopping for another insurance company? I get competing quotes for insurance every year for exactly this reason. There's no downside to shopping around, and you'll quickly find whether your rates are competitive or not.

Get a quote from another vendor, if it's substantially lower, go back and tell your insurance company that you're leaving and see what their retention specialists can do for you. Insurance companies will ding long-term customers unless you spook them every few years.

The standard BS answer I had to give as an auto insurance customer service rep was "due to an increase in claims in your area we had to increase our rates for all customers." This means, we increased our rates because we wanted to. The rate increase is probably not "mandated" by the state insurance commission but "approved." Shop around to see if you can get something cheaper.

In most states, insurance rate increases have to be approved by a state Insurance Commissioner. As far as I know, they usually set maximum rates, not mandatory rates, and it's quite likely that someone (probably the person who shouted an answer to your telephone representative while you're on hold) confused "approved a rate increase" with "raised the rates". You should still get competitive quotes from other companies, but it is possible, especially with a smaller state such as Maryland, that the insurers pooled their data for the rate filing & they might all have gotten the rate increase. (Insurance is treated as a regulated monopoly because of this data sharing, that's why there's a commission to set rates)

Every business everywhere will point a finger at something to explain a rate increase. For a while Dodd-Frank was the go-to blame. The sensible response to this is "no shit you have costs and some of them are regulatory; that's called 'business'" but everyone likes a game of pass the buck - including you. After all, that's why you called and asked for an explanation. You wouldn't have been happy with "because it did" but really that's what it is. So is it a BS answer? Kinda and kinda not, I would say. But it's irrelevant - you don't really care why so much as you just don't want to pay more and are trying to decide if their stated reasoning is good enough for you to avoid doing more than being irked. Insurance is marginally different than most expenses since there's always a regulatory board; ditto and more so for power companies. But still, the rate is what the rate is and if you don't like it, shop around and/or write your local regulatory body. I have not personally experienced this constant rate increase that people above claim happens, and have periodically gotten refund checks, but that may be a function of how my insurance company is organized. If you're not happy then shop around. Personally I have now dealt with enough spread of insurance companies that I am not going to shop purely on price anytime soon; I have had too much annoyance from no-name oddballs and GEICO when having to collect from other people's insurance. That's part of my calculation of worth, as was the convenience of using Parkmobile when they upped their transaction fee a year or two ago. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/11/01/parkmobile-durbin-swipe-fees_n_2059451.html which I think is primarily horseshit, but in the end the upshot to me is no different: it's $0.13 more every time I use the app. It's worth it to me, regardless of whether the reason it went up is a CEO boat payment or an increase in credit card clearinghouse costs due to regulation that stops cost-shifting based on card user profiles and loyalty programs. If you don't care who provides your insurance then shop around. If you sorta care then shop around and call them back and say "XYZ company will do this for less; how bad do you want to keep me?" Or just pay it and stop worrying about why it's more.

This is an argument for pricing your insurance at least once a year, if not twice. The advent of online comparison sites makes it super easy. But yeah 100 bucks would be a huge fee increase. I'm sure they are either lying or misspeaking.

I had Progressive for a short time when I lived in MA. After a year, they increased my rate by $200/year. (And I had no accidents, tickets, etc.) When I called them about it, they told me the extra fees were due to a state-wide increase and there was nothing to be done about it. I called another insurance company (state farm) who quoted me what I was getting previously and switched.

This is what my company (esurance) told me about Rhode island a few weeks ago when I questioned a similar price jump. No idea if it's bs, I'll be watching the answers with interest.

This is what car insurance companies do (and other insurance companies). They increase the rate when your policy automatically renews, because x% of customers won't check the new rate/will check the new rate won't bother to change providers. The money they lose in people moving away from them due to the rate increase is more than made up for by the money they make on people who don't change. The best thing to do is just change insurance provider every year (using a comparison site to find the best deal) so you get the "new customer" decent rate. In the ~15 years I've been driving, I've probably stayed with the same insurance company 2 years in a row... twice I think? You can also call them up again and tell them you're cancelling because they cost too much and Other Provider is only $X (get a real rate, don't make it up) - sometimes they will magically find a discount for you so you can get a a good deal without having to change insurance company. (I'm in the UK but the process seems broadly similar if you're in the US).