There's another aspect of this situation that also is overlooked. Because of an ongoing consolidation of independently owned body shops being bought up by nationwide chains such as the one I was towed to they are beholden to provide closely monitored estimates that conform to the insurance company's demands that clearly impact decisions whether a car is deemed repairable vs. to be scrapped. Often, as documented above, when the body shop, who also serves as the "adjuster" for the insurer, is confronted as I did regarding a dubious report they submitted they simply say they have to align their interests with the insurance company's dictates as to how they want to determination to end up if they, the national body shop chain, is to receive "recommendations" as to who gets a significant volume of their work

Continued...

 

WOW. Just Wow.

If insurance companies are allowed to dictate to a shop whether or not your car is determined to be "Totaled" or "Total Loss" before it even hits the shop and the shop is beholden to deem your car what the ins company says to report, if they want to receive future "recommendations" in order to have a steady flow of business from ins co and to stay with the nat'l body shop chain -- then this is just Cuckcoo CRAZY!!

It smells of a class action lawsuit waiting to happen against the insurance companies and/or the nat'l body shop chain.

I understand these kinds of rackets prob happen all the time, but my gosh... this is NOT good and WHY are these kinds of "things" allowed to happen and NOT regulated.

Wow. This is good to know.

@Hemisphere -- PLEASE keep us posted on your to be "Continued"...

 

I recently gifted my wife's car to my youngest daughter and became a 1 car household and Progressive said my premiums would increase! I pointed out, my wife, who passed in January, drove her car about 15,000 miles a year and I drive my SC430 about 6,000 a year. So as a household we went from two cars with 2 people driving 21,000 a year to one person driving 6,000 and you want to increase my premiums? WTF! I talked them down to around the old premium and made the decision to fire Progression as soon as possible. I'm currently working with an independent agent to find the best option and it's down to SafeCo (Liberty mutual) and Selective (which allows for define value coverage), To make it more interesting I going to pick up a 2017 Porsche Boxster S next week so this is built into the quotes. My agent is checking to see how moving my homeowners insurance will reduce my premium as Liberty Mutual give a $300 credit for combined coverage. The quoted value for Liberty Mutual on 2008 SC430 with 132,000 miles is $16,500 which is close to the Kelly Blue Book amount of $17,200. While Selective will allow a defined value the premium looks to be about a $1,000 a year more so far. Stay tuned!

 

Just a comment about how we as consumers can get a decent deal for ourselves on insurance coverage - speaking as a long standing finance person ( not automotive finance alone, all kinds of finance including national and international banks and large insurance co.s). The biz model of the auto insurance co is to gradually increase your premium each year you stay with them because from their perspective, the mkt value of what they insure depreciates while a rising premium increases reported profit margin at the insurance co. It is not about being fair to us the individuals, it is about reporting good numbers on profitability. Their shareholders come first, despite anything that is said about client service coming first etc.. However, they also have to report growth in order for Wall St to love/like them which means they need increased mkt share over time. Thus each insurance co has a couple of objectives when facing us the insured individuals: 1) squeeze the already insured as much as they can until we the insured are close to the point of going to another insurance co., then stop. Because loss of a good customer hurts a metric the insurance co.s report called persistency ratio. A low persistency ratio causes Wall St to like the insurance co less .... - "not a durable business etc etc" 2) Always try to get new customers in the door by giving out promotional attractive rates to those insured by some other insurance co. - this takes market share from a competitor insurance co and allows their own reported policy growth numbers to look better. But this same new insured client can be squeezed the very next year to increase profit margin - you can bet on that 1000000%.

SOOOO, for us the insured, given what insurance cos have to do ( BTW all of this is entirely legal, no wrong doing on the part of the insurance cos here at all from a financial regulation point of view), it makes the most sense to shop your business every two years. For me, I shop sometimes after only one year with an insurance co. It is worthwhile trying to catch the promo rate from insurance cos wanting to expand their business at the expense of their competitors because that is just good for you, the insured. If you stay with one insurance co too long, you are simply helping that insurance co's reported profit given they move you up the premium ladder, you are not helping yourself. And I think we as consumers have a loyalty to ourselves, not the profits of the insurance co....

 

@OBP — Thanks much for this helpful info.

We’ve never thought about switching ins companies before. I take that back. Years and years ago, when we have shopped around to see if we could get a better rate, we didn’t find one. And so, from the get go, as you say, we’ve been very loyal to USAA, not just with our car ins, but also auto loans, mortgages, homeowners ins. We’ve never thought about shopping around since then and maybe it was more for convenience of having everything under one roof and not having to switch it up. As far as car ins, they’ve been great when we’ve had to make claims and have given us rebate checks through the yrs, when there’s been a surplus in premiums vs amount of claims paid out.

It’s our fault for not shopping around since then and possibly saving money when we could. The information you provided has given us pause to make sure we are getting the most out of what we’re paying for. Appreciate the help