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?