Insurance cancelation

[tonytheskin]

I went to a local agent when I got my first coach and they submitted it to Progressive and Progressives computer lists it as commercial and said they had to do a commercial policy. The policy was still cheap but now I'm with "The General" and its even cheaper.

[Morella]

Beware of cheap insurance. If you're blamed for an accident and you don't have enough liability to cover it, the settlement comes out of your ass. All of your property, bank accounts, investments, etc. can be taken. I've even heard of wages being garnished.

I like Allstate. Our agent knows everyone in our family. When I bought my new car, I called him at 8pm, and he sent a fax to the dealership for proof of coverage. When I had my accident, he gave me the number to call to get $1000 in medical payments that I didn't even know I had, and someone answered right away and said just to send her the receipts. A bad insurance agent can really mess up the complexities of an accident settlement, and a good one is a lifesaver.

Think about insurance companies that use cartoon characters to advertise...to whom are they trying to appeal? They are looking for a customer base of young people, who are easier to take advantage of. Just as with a bank, you are trusting your assets to an insurance company. When an accident happens, and if the other party ends up calling a lawyer, they won't just sue your insurance company. They will also sue you personally. If your insurance company's adjuster acts like an a$$hole or makes an insulting settlement offer, you are going to end up paying out the wazoo. I know this because it happened in my accident, in 2004. The other driver's adjuster acted like an ass, and made a ridiculously low offer of $12,500, so I just refused to talk to him and called a lawyer. I might have dealt with someone who was civil, but as it was, they ended up having to pay about $27,000, plus $5600 for my truck. My lawyer got about $9k. If it had gone to court, the settlement might have been twice that. Will "The General" pay that much for one person injured in an accident? Our policy will.

If you have nothing to lose, and don't expect to ever have anything, maybe you can get by with cheap insurance, but I hope that someone with cheap insurance and no assets ever hits me and puts me in a wheelchair for life.

I'm not trying to start an argument...25 years ago, I used to believe that I shouldn't have to pay for auto insurance, but this is something that I'm glad I didn't have to learn the hard way. An injury accident is extremely complicated, and you definitely want the best people on your side.

...and if you have to hire an attorney, I wouldn't recommend using one of those big law firms that advertise on phone books and television. Their interest is in closing the case as quickly as possible, so they are quick to try to talk you into accepting a smaller settlement which will leave you close to nothing. They get their money off of the top of the settlement, so they don't care. I waited two years for mine, because I refused to settle for chump change. The longer they pharted around, the worse my neck injury got, the more the medical bills were, the more they had to pay. My lawyer went back after the case was settled and talked the medical provider into accepting thousands less for my bills, money that all went to me. It didn't pay him a dime to do that. An "assembly line" law firm probably would not have done that for you. I could have left many thousands of dollars lying on the table if I had gone to Onkstein, Levenbaugh, Meyer, Goldmiser, Jacober and Schwartz. They got to be large law firms by making money for themselves, not for their clients.

It's unfortunate that you don't really find out what you've been paying for until after a disaster happens, so I guess the best thing to do would be to get as much good advice as you can.

-denise

[BIGEVIL]

^^^^^^^^^

Good advice.

I was hit by an illegal in my 1st hearse (his fault). At the time I figured that since I only drove it once in a while, I only needed "state minimum". After all was said and done, I was ASS OUT.

[LorcinLS1]

The hearse was added to our haggerty policy. The cost for it is $100.00 for a year.

[HellCat]

We pay less than $300 a year for the hearse....I'm thinking closer to $250.00. I know that the rate is going to go down even more this year because after a policy has aged 10 years with State Farm with no claims the rate drops even more.

Yea I have to agree with Denise on the cheap insurance companies...you have to watch the fine print with those guys.

[Xanthus]

Yeah, much truth there.

BTW my friends got their insurance issues handled.

I have a great agent so I do not actually call most of the companies myself, but I know sometimes they can try to give the uneducated (in insurance specifics) the run-around. My main policy tried to not cover my occasional use vehicle due to miles we requested for it. It took my agent showing him that a once a month trip across the state could eat up the months miles, showing that even with that higher limit it was still an occasional use vahicle. Now In addition to that policy my coach is covered by Hagerty.