Article Number 1
GetCoveredUSA.com
March 21, 2009

Comprehensive Claims - Can They Hurt You?

In short, yes but this claim is considered minor if the amount is low and you dont make them with frequency. Frequency is by far the deciding factor.

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The long answer is that even one comp claim might keep you out of a top rating insurance bracket of certain insurance carriers that would otherwise offer you the best possible rate. Each insurance carrier has its own appetite as to what is too often of a frequency of comp claims made. However if you have a noticeable trend of making one at scheduled intervals, it is very likely that this trend will be spotted. Even though these claims are often only counted for the previous 36 months, they remain on your CLUE Report for as long as 5 years. Some insurance carriers will view the 5 year claims history and look for things like a stolen vehicle every 32 months or large comp claims every 24 months. You might even be turned down for having 3 or more comp claims within a 36 month period.

Some people are bitter that they have to pay for insurance but seem to get nothing out of it. Make sure you dont make insurance claims just to do it or to try and "Get your money back" from the insurance company. It would be a bad situation if you make 3 claims for $500 then all the sudden your car gets stolen and you have a 4th claim in a short period of time, your rate goes up and you cant even switch to another company because of your claims history.

Glass Claims

Glass Buyback deductibles can be stapled on to any auto insurance policy that has Comprehensive Coverage on it. Many insureds drove to this coverage in masses and demand that they have it on their vehicle. Why? While some can say they've never been in an accident and others can testify that they've never gotten a speeding ticket or ran a red light. Nobody can say they haven't had a cracked windshield. But what is very commonly misunderstood is that Glass Coverage really only applies to the replacement of the entire windshield. Many insurance companies will cover chips and repairs to windshields without the addition of this rider to your auto policy. Think back now of how many of those windows had to be replaced as opposed to only fixed! If you've had 1 replacement made in the last 10 years but have paid for glass coverage that entire time then you probably lost a little money since the repairs would have been done for free.

Heres a suggestion to save some money, this works especially well if you have more than one car:

Exclusions: This tends to work better for drivers that dont drive more than 12,000 miles a year or dont often drive in areas with lots of debris on the roads at higher rates of speed. If you have a long history of breaking entire windshields then you probably already know you are going to be making this claim. However, keep in mind that anything that is not a repair is still a Comprehensive Claim and can increase your premium rate! You might try a variation of this theory because 5 windshield replacements in 3 years will hurt you with most companies if not completely exclude you from qualifying as an insured. Saving $300 every 8 months but paying $2000 a year more in premium will never benefit you.

A Final Note About Deductibles

We have heard reports of one company that very aggressively markets deductibles higher than the very common $500 one. They have even gone to the extent of creating oddball $750 and $1250 deductibles. There are many reasons why they do this and you might initially think its because their being nice trying to save you money by offering you all these additional options. The bottom line is its a sales tool in that they can offer you a policy with a deductible that cannot be compared to a standard auto policy. The main reason is that it discourages claims. Whats the biggest expense of an insurance company besides employees and stock dividends? Claims Payouts! If the average Comprehensive Claim is $800 and Insurance Company A has a $750 deductible, they will see a huge decrease in paid out claims in comparison to the $500 deducts! How many people will file a claim to get $300 as opposed to how many would file to get $50?

GetCoveredUSA.com Insurance Tip: Comprehensive Coverage is always cheaper than Collision Coverage. Mainly because comp claims tend to be small in amount compared to the average Collision Claim.

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