Insurance
 

My wife and I have been with the same auto insurance carrier for 15+ years and it's been a good little while since I last got quotes. When I did it last time, none of the others would have saved us much so we did nothing. With the 2 recent not at fault accidents and her 1 at fault in the 3-5 year range, I thought now might be a good time to get another round of quotes since some of the time based discounts are gone or minimal.

Also, I'm having some bad feelings about our carrier. I'm still ticked about the two days I lost at MVA in September because they couldn't figure out how to send a form to MVA saying my insurance had not lapsed while the repeatedly told me they sent it when they had not. They've also treated my wife kind of poorly re: her crash last week even after the other driver's insurance
Accepted full liability.

I spent a couple hours getting online quotes from 7 or 8 carriers and have another few left to do. All the quotes are for the same coverage (or as close to it as possible) and paid six months at a time. The spread from cheapest to most expensive is pretty incredible with the most expensive nearly three times as much as least expensive. What's also bizarre is the spread in the different line items. Carrier 1 will be way more than Carrier 2 for Coverage A, but they'll be reversed for Coverage B.

Our current premium sits right in the middle of the range.

One of the quotes was almost identical. An agent from that carrier called the house a little while later while I was out and told my wife the quote didn't include all the discounts that should have applied. Well, why the fuck not?

This is such a pain in the ass.

I try to do it every 3 or 4 years, but I take the lazy route and use a broker and let them do the shopping. Come to think of it, I'm about due to give him a call.

I've never had much luck with online insurance quotes. I have always felt it is better to have a face-to-face, personal relationship with a local agent (most of the past 30 years have been with State Farm)

I have a local independent agent and he has access to MANY companies.
Each year, on his own, he runs my numbers through his system and lets me know if anything is of interest.

A few years back he also got wind of a pretty significant rate increase my (then) carrier was going to do. He found me a good alternative and I switched accordingly.

Instead of playing with each company yourself - I favor getting someone to do it for you.

I've had the same insurance for the last 15 years, so I'm not the right person to ask :lol:

Having said that, our carrier did an awesome job handling the two claims we've made so far. One for a new windshield for the Mazda a couple years ago and one just last week for damage the Mazda sustained when a pickup truck lost a 2x6 out of its bed and it took part of the front bumper off.

Recently switched from State Farm to Amica. Saving about 10%.

I've been in the business for a while now. Bottom line, shop around and do so every 2-3 years as things are always changing.

Generally, Geico or Progressive will be cheapest but also generally have worse service when/if end end up filing a claim. They're more likely to nickel and dime you.

Beyond that, it's up to you how you prefer to buy... Direct or via an agent. I'd recommend at least talking to an independent agent and see what quotes they can get you. They are not tied to one individual carrier like exclusive agents (ex. State Farm, Allstate, Nationwide) so they can shop 5-6 carriers to get you options. These are also typically companies that don't sell direct so they can access companies you aren't seeing if you shop online yourself.

A few things to beware of...
A) do you insure your home with the same company? If so, you're probably getting a discount on both policies that you'll lose if you switch just your auto. May be worth asking an agent to quote both for you, since you might also be overpaying for home insurance anyways.
B) beware of "disappearing discounts" - these are things like early shopper, new client discounts, etc. They roll off over time so your rates will go up without even factoring in general rate increases. It causes some people to feel like they are getting a bait and switch after a year.

Pricing insurance is tricky because it's all about making a prediction about future losses with limited info. Carriers use many variables about you and set rates based on their historical experience. The huge rate differences you see on quotes are actually very common just because you are getting segmented differently by each carrier because they use different variables to price the policy, and one might group you into a preferred bucket while looking at a different set of variables you might not be as preferred by another carrier. That's why you should always shop around every few years.

Of the 8 companies I have solid quotes from, Geico is the cheapest by far. But, they're geico and fuck geico. But they're really, really cheap. A few years back there were reports of them trolling results of certain events and dropping people wih the same names. Not completely sure if they were true and reports of new instances dried up after that one period. Geico was also the company that tried to deny coverage to drivers that used radar detectors in the late 80s and the MD and CA insurance commissioners told them to take a flying fuck.

What I'd like to see before I commit to anything is the full policy, especially its exclusions, and be able to see it without directly asking for it and probably prompting questions.

A simple way it was explained to me a while back - The more you see advertising for an insurance company, the less desirable they are to have.

Not totally true necessarily, but an interesting rule of thumb.

Insurance
 

It's all about the distribution channel. Direct sellers like Geico and Progressive spend hundreds of millions in marketing to create buzz and awareness, but you know what? They still have a lower overall expense ratio and lower rates than most other carriers. The carriers that sell through independent agents focus more on selling business insurance and let the agents do marketing to get customers for personal insurance. But you know what? The money they aren't spending on TV ads, they are paying out in very healthy agent commissions to pay them for their time and effort generating business.

At the end of the day, I wouldn't let a TV ad turn you off. But I'd also be very cautious about buying from Gecko or Flo. There isn't any one right answer- the rates are so different for everyone that what works for you will be different than what works for someone else.