Auto insurance companies return $800 million in premiums because no one is driving

[hegemony]

Auto insurance companies return $800 million in premiums because no one is driving

[smartlypretty]

I wish they'd return mine, it's almost $5000 a year 😕 

 

ETA and I'm never driving, I have telecommuted since 2009.

Edited April 6, 2020 by smartlypretty

[centex]

1 hour ago, smartlypretty said:

I wish they'd return mine, it's almost $5000 a year 😕 

 

ETA and I'm never driving, I have telecommuted since 2009.

Good gawd!  What sort of vehicles and what coverages...either you have a horrendous driving record or it is time to change carriers. 

 

I'm not paying that much and I have five vehicles on my policy.  Even if I had swapped the F-type out for the Aston, it would not have been over $5K. 

[hegemony]

49 minutes ago, centex said:

Good gawd!  What sort of vehicles and what coverages...either you have a horrendous driving record or it is time to change carriers. 

 

I'm not paying that much and I have five vehicles on my policy.  Even if I had swapped the F-type out for the Aston, it would not have been over $5K. 

I have four vehicles and for a married couple in a high risk urban area we pay less than half of that.

[smartlypretty]

51 minutes ago, centex said:

Good gawd!  What sort of vehicles and what coverages...either you have a horrendous driving record or it is time to change carriers. 

 

I'm not paying that much and I have five vehicles on my policy.  Even if I had swapped the F-type out for the Aston, it would not have been over $5K. 

 

43 minutes ago, hegemony said:

I have four vehicles and for a married couple in a high risk urban area we pay less than half of that.

I have no accidents. I have a male teenager driver who was licensed in October and got into a small accident in January. They estimated $X K damage at first and it was no big deal.

 

Three weeks later they tripled the estimate, totaled the car, and took six weeks to resolve it. So one accident, one teenager, high rate area.

 

One car, a 2019, for which I financed a little over $15K. The car is, I think, valued higher, but that's why.

 

It sucks but I just have to wait for it to go back. It wasn't even that low before, before he got his license, for just me it was $180 a month, with one $10,000 car. 

 

No tickets, no violations, and I've never been in an accident personally.

[randian]

53 minutes ago, centex said:

Good gawd!  What sort of vehicles and what coverages...either you have a horrendous driving record or it is time to change carriers. 

 

I'm not paying that much and I have five vehicles on my policy.  Even if I had swapped the F-type out for the Aston, it would not have been over $5K. 

Could be their location. No-fault states tend to have very high premiums, for example.

[Burgerwars]

I've haven't heard anything from my insurance (21st Century/Farmers). Maybe it's coming. I drive to my I.T. job early each morning (it's considered essential). Only a three mile drive. I often can see a mile in front of me. No cars to hit, except parked cars.

Edited April 6, 2020 by Burgerwars

[kaylee34]

Flo is reportedly weighing options but I don’t see the little green lizard giving up anything. 

[hegemony]

The General has been demoted to a subprime Lt. Colonel

[hegemony]

Allstate is providing more than $600 million to auto insurance customers amid pandemic

[StarkRaven$]

1 hour ago, Burgerwars said:

I've haven't heard anything from my insurance (21st Century/Farmers). Maybe it's coming. I drive to my I.T. job early each morning (it's considered essential). Only a three mile drive. I often can see a mile in front of me. No cars to hit, except parked cars.

That's the same auto insurance I have. Haven't heard a peep but my rates are reasonable in spite of my age.

[IndyPoolPlayer]

2 hours ago, kaylee34 said:

Flo is reportedly weighing options but I don’t see the little green lizard giving up anything. 

My Good Neighbor isn't being very neighborly

[cv91915]

(((399.87/6)*0.15)*2) back from Esurance on one of our vehicles (the others are insured elsewhere).

 

Tonight we're going to party like it's $19.99.

 

 

Edited April 7, 2020 by cv91915

[StarkRaven$]

I guess that guy was right sitting on a sofa in the middle of the street. We're in good hands.

 

[centex]

18 hours ago, smartlypretty said:

 

I have no accidents. I have a male teenager driver who was licensed in October and got into a small accident in January. They estimated $X K damage at first and it was no big deal.

 

Three weeks later they tripled the estimate, totaled the car, and took six weeks to resolve it. So one accident, one teenager, high rate area.

 

One car, a 2019, for which I financed a little over $15K. The car is, I think, valued higher, but that's why.

 

It sucks but I just have to wait for it to go back. It wasn't even that low before, before he got his license, for just me it was $180 a month, with one $10,000 car. 

 

No tickets, no violations, and I've never been in an accident personally.

Time to bounce the child from the policy and tell them that, if they want to drive, they can pay their OWN policy premium. 

 

In the interim, you will ALSO want to look at your deductibles.  The agent should be willing to run them at varying levels.  Collision is essentially a tax on personal stupidity, but since you seem to have a note on the vehicle, it is a requirement.  Put the deductible at a level that satisfies the lender.  Comprehensive is something you should be able to raise.  With little driving being done, you should also pursue an evaluation based on work-short, which many carriers will use to re-evaluate premiums where there is a short distance being driven.  Look at other discounts as well, such as the defensive driving, college educated and other options...

 

Valuation of the car is a factor with SOME components of the premium, but $15K is NOT a high value as it relates to vehicles. 

 

Oh...and shop other carriers...since the teen driver is a piece of the equation that was not in the original discussions, that is a variable that will see premiums all over the place. 

[IndyPoolPlayer]

@centex With some insurers, and depending upon your state, just having a licensed teenage driver in the home will place said teenager on your insurance. When 8-Ball was contemplating coming to live with me when he was 18, I went to my Good Neighbor and looked at options for insurance. My agent told me as long as he was residing in the house, it would be assumed he would have access to all vehicles and charged accordingly. Too many people put the kids on their Beige Bettys and the kids are driving the nice cars and getting into crashes.

[centex]

52 minutes ago, IndyPoolPlayer said:

@centex With some insurers, and depending upon your state, just having a licensed teenage driver in the home will place said teenager on your insurance. When 8-Ball was contemplating coming to live with me when he was 18, I went to my Good Neighbor and looked at options for insurance. My agent told me as long as he was residing in the house, it would be assumed he would have access to all vehicles and charged accordingly. Too many people put the kids on their Beige Bettys and the kids are driving the nice cars and getting into crashes.

Sounds like more States need to function like the Texas regulations provide for...if someone resides in a household and is NOT a named driver AND gets into an accident in a vehicle they are not a named driver of, the insurance company owes NOTHING in the way of support and everything is squarely upon the named insured.  And, by the way, the named insured will then be given two options- substantially higher premiums or find a new carrier. 

 

This holds true regardless of the age of the other occupants of the house.  When my ex-partner was living with me, I was able to name which vehicle she would be potentially driving.  My carrier treated her in the same manner was they would any other spousal unit.  But it was made very clear (by both carriers- two cars are on a specialty policy) that I was on my own if something happened while she was behind the wheel of one I had not named her as a potential driver of (save for any sort of a documented emergency where we were literally enroute to a hospital).  What was interesting was that they did not change the premium amount when I added her... 

[hdporter]

Just want to note that while someone's premium may seem high, don't discount the difference geography, metro area, and state can make.  I got a real lesson in this this last month in conjunction with my suspended relocation from GA to MA.

 

Now, our vehicles "new" cost approx $30k and $50k.  Given that I've stressed here that we buy for long-term ownership, it shouldn't surprise you that the blue book values sit at $2k and $10k.  I maintain strong coverage (obviously dropping to "limited" collision on the lesser valued car, though).  Sitting outside of Atlanta by 30 mi, my premium is $3400.  (And if you're shaking your head over that, I beat you to the punch ... but competitive quoting didn't yield much better.)

 

So, with a schedule ship of our vehicles to MA set for Mar 30, it was with some trepidation that I notified my auto insurer of the move and braced for stiffer premium, with a home now 30-mi outside of Boston, a market I imagined had higher collision cost.  The revised annual premium:  $1100.  I practically did a cartwheel (I think I actually did a small jig ;).

 

A little research shows just how business friendly GA is whereas MA is fiercely consumer protective. 

 

Oh, and when I had to call GEICO to tell them of the stalled move:  The $3400 premium is reinstated. 

[smartlypretty]

1 hour ago, centex said:

Time to bounce the child from the policy and tell them that, if they want to drive, they can pay their OWN policy premium. 

 

In the interim, you will ALSO want to look at your deductibles.  The agent should be willing to run them at varying levels.  Collision is essentially a tax on personal stupidity, but since you seem to have a note on the vehicle, it is a requirement.  Put the deductible at a level that satisfies the lender.  Comprehensive is something you should be able to raise.  With little driving being done, you should also pursue an evaluation based on work-short, which many carriers will use to re-evaluate premiums where there is a short distance being driven.  Look at other discounts as well, such as the defensive driving, college educated and other options...

 

Valuation of the car is a factor with SOME components of the premium, but $15K is NOT a high value as it relates to vehicles. 

 

Oh...and shop other carriers...since the teen driver is a piece of the equation that was not in the original discussions, that is a variable that will see premiums all over the place. 

I've gotten that advice, but in the household we're in, with our profile, my biggest worry is my child feeling like he has to choose work to drive over school. I want him to choose school. Our household identity is one where I can't easily hardline like that without setting my kid on a path of choosing work over college, and it isn't forever.

 

This is the state minimum, this is a no-fault state and I stripped it down when it went up. I got quotes from everyone and their mother, every single licensed insurer in this state. To even get the rate I finally got ($2200 for six months, a discount) the broker I ended up using had to pull some weird technicality stunts, which worked and I had to pay it in full. So the deductibles are the highest allowed by law ($1000 per) and I need collision and the other thing.

 

Valuation on $15K I agree isn't that impactful. I don't think they're valuing the car that way, I think they're valuing it at market value, which is quite a bit higher. It's probably $25K or a little lower?

 

I've gotten about 12 discrete quotes, even finding insurers no one knew about, and most quotes were unfortunately higher. 

 

One of the insurers in this area which is lesser known said I can switch to them in July (six months after the fender bender) and they can re-write my police for $236 a month. Which is low for this state and a teen driver. 

1 hour ago, IndyPoolPlayer said:

@centex With some insurers, and depending upon your state, just having a licensed teenage driver in the home will place said teenager on your insurance. When 8-Ball was contemplating coming to live with me when he was 18, I went to my Good Neighbor and looked at options for insurance. My agent told me as long as he was residing in the house, it would be assumed he would have access to all vehicles and charged accordingly. Too many people put the kids on their Beige Bettys and the kids are driving the nice cars and getting into crashes.

Just to get an idea of this, I did ask about leaving my son off the quote to compare. And insurers say I have to sign a binding form that he will not drive the car ever, and if he does, he gets arrested. 

 

It's a WHOLE THING with teenagers, and they immediately pick up the teenager being licensed and you have to do that swearing thing OR eat the rate change. And if you don't have them on the insurance and something happens it is another big thing.

 

Since it is POSSIBLE in July this will drop by almost half (which I am hoping is the case), it's a short time comparatively and I figured just dealing with it is the easiest thing.

 

I don't like it, but I don't want to put my kid in a position where he has to choose between working immediately at any job he can get or continue applying to school. I want him to go to school (or trade school) and not feel pushed into any job going. This is a thing because in lopsided families it's like this, you don't want to financially hobble kids any further. 

 

ETA: I have been trying to be vague because there are people I don't want to Google and find me (a hazard in my line of work) but I live in New York in an area for all intents and purposes priced like the five boroughs, and the car is a 2019 Buick Encore, Essence trim. So that's the purchase price v. valuation thing.

 

The broker I talked to last advised me to try to get my kid to get a beater and take him off THIS car and it would be cheaper. 

Edited April 7, 2020 by smartlypretty
making better sense

[Occam]

20 hours ago, smartlypretty said:

it's almost $5000 a year 😕 

 

and I'm never driving, I have telecommuted since 2009.

For $5000 a year you could buy a really nice bicycle and have plenty left over to rent a car when you need one.

[hegemony]

1 hour ago, Occam said:

For $5000 a year you could buy a really nice bicycle and have plenty left over to rent a car when you need one.

uber too

[Burgerwars]

23 hours ago, creditmaze said:

That's the same auto insurance I have. Haven't heard a peep but my rates are reasonable in spite of my age.

21st Century/Farmers did send me an email today saying if you're having trouble paying your premiums on time, they'll not immediately cancel your coverage and they may be able to help, but nothing about reduced premiums.

 

[hegemony]

no word from Amica

[StarkRaven$]

54 minutes ago, Burgerwars said:

21st Century/Farmers did send me an email today saying if you're having trouble paying your premiums on time, they'll not immediately cancel your coverage and they may be able to help, but nothing about reduced premiums.

 

Interesting. I haven't received anything but I already have a good rate based on low mileage, driving record, union discount and type of car.

[smartlypretty]

6 hours ago, hegemony said:

uber too

My sister-in-law lives in London and when I was there last, their car had just given up the ghost and they worked out that it was cheaper to use ZipCars in London- for some reason they ended up getting a car, but during that time they were like collecting five or so on their street.

 

My main car use is going to Trader Joe's about once a week and it's pretty far, alas.

1 hour ago, Burgerwars said:

21st Century/Farmers did send me an email today saying if you're having trouble paying your premiums on time, they'll not immediately cancel your coverage and they may be able to help, but nothing about reduced premiums.

 

Flo has a no cancellations notice on the site, which disappears if you sign in and is easy to miss. That feels not accidental- I have a balance I'm waiting to pay so I can put it on my CSP when it comes, and it makes you feel like it's urgent but I want those points, dammit.