Auto Insurance Rating Myths

It’s not easy to wait for your new or renewal auto insurance rate quote. While you wait, all the driving sins you’ve committed over the past year or more rest heavily on your shoulders and you may become increasingly certain that every decision you’ve made, including the color you’ve chosen for your car, will backfire on you.

A lot of these worries are due to myths that abound about auto insurance rating. Let’s take a few moments to bust some of them.

Car color determines rates: When was the last time an auto insurance company or agent even asked you what color your car was? That answer should be never, because car color does not factor into auto insurance rates. While a sports car might be given a higher rate than a sedan, the color has nothing to do with it; it’s all about the propensity of a driver of one type of car to behave a certain way and, subsequently, introduce more risk to the insurer.

Personal ownership of the vehicle means personal insurance is needed: When you insure a vehicle, you are insuring it against the risks it faces while it is in use—not the risks it faces due to the name on the title. If you use your personally owned vehicle for your business, then you need commercial auto insurance, no matter what or what owns it.

Getting married makes auto insurance rates cheap: When underwriters determine your risk and decide how much you should be charged, they look for insights about your potential behavior based on your age, marital status and driving record. So while getting married definitely helps to make you look like a more conservative driver, your driving record could counter-balance that and leave you with no significant discounts due to marital status.

Having an accident will increase your rates: The nature of any accidents you have will go far in determining whether or not you suffer a rate increase as a result. If you have an accident and your driving did not contribute to it, but you have a claim against the uninsured motorist coverage on your policy, then there may be no rate increase at all. Insurance companies are looking for behaviors that deserve rate increases, not incidents beyond your control.

When it comes to something as intangible as an auto insurance rating system, myths are sure to abound. But there is a simple way to bust the myths and get to the truth—and that is to call your agent. He or she will help you determine what is fact and what is myth when it comes to your auto insurance premium.


Let Worthington Insurance help you with a Philadelphia Auto Insurance quote today!