A few months ago I had a minor fender bender, which involved only me and my broken bumper, which is not a story I’d like to share. Not a big deal except that I just bought the car (a very cute Pontiac G6 with a sunroof) in February 2008 and the bumper had a long noticeable slice. I worried that it was going to fall off on the highway so I went ahead and filed a claim with my insurance and paid the deductible. Pretty simple, it was replaced and reverted to brand new in less than a week.
I knew the claim would raise my insurance with State Farm, whom I have been with since around 2006, so I went in to the office and asked the agent to look at my policy and make sure I didn’t have anything on it that I didn’t need. Apparently I did, because we shaved off about $20.00.
I was happy. Car was fixed. Insurance was lowered.
Until a couple months later, when I noticed that my insurance was $20 more than it was before the claim. Which means, to me, that it actually jumped $40. I called the agent to find out what happened and here are the reasons State Farm raised my insurance bill:
The claim on the bumper was considered some kind of weird accident.
The claim indicated that State Farm needed to pull my credit report.
Because my credit sucks momentarily, my rate was increased.
Nothing I could really argue about, until now that a couple more months have passed, I’m starting to find it hard to believe that the bumper was worth another $40 a month. I’ve never made a late payment to State Farm because they’re on automatic debit. Why would they penalize me for my credit? Further, if I’ve been paying almost $100 a month for insurance since 2006, plus a $500 deductible on the bumper, I pretty much paid for that bumper myself.
I don’t know. I’m considering shopping around, I just hate to lose the history I’ve built up with State Farm. I also wonder what good it will do if all of the insurance companies are going to run my credit anyway.
I have to admit I’m really starting to relate to those crazy insurance conspiracy theorists. Is auto insurance a scam?
Or does State Farm really just hate me?
3 Comments
It’s definitely worth shopping around. Unfortunately, I think it’s pretty common these days to pull a credit report, so you might not have as good of luck getting good rates until your credit score goes up. Insurance companies are in the business of risk, so it stands to reason that they’re going to evaluate the risk of their customers as part of the operations. Insurance is a big area to look at for potential savings. I can’t remember who it is, but I’ve even seen a blogger (one of the big dogs) who takes off one vacation day every year just to evaluate his policies, call around, and make sure he’s comfortable that he’s paying the best rates. So, I would definitely take a look around so long as your expectations are in check.
Sweetie, State Farm hates everybody, it’s not just you, Infact Brian and I just had this conversation the other day and State Farm was half the topic when insurance companies came up… They charge too much and they underdeliver, I would definately look into Progressive or somewhere else, we use Geico now, and we had Allstate before them. I had a claim with Allstate, replaced my back window on my blazer because a piece fell off the glass and they didn’t bat an eyelash even though it was a $1000 replacement and my monthly did not go up… And always carry glass coverage on your insurance policy even if your vehicle is paid off….!
I’m with Progressive. They’ve been pretty good to me. My credit sucks, I’m poor and have switched auto insurance companies a few times. The have really great customer service and Roadside assistance…which when you are Murphy’s Law like me comes in handy
Best of Luck! Love the blog