Your Credit Score Is Affecting Your Car Insurance Rate

The application before you looks rather perfect. The page that requests any past violations of the driving codes is blank, the page for past at fault claims is blank, your car is well rounded and homey and a few years old, your in your early thirties…you should be getting the best car insurance rate out there, right? Until the end of the paperwork when your car insurance agent turns around and tells you what the cost of your six month premium would be, and your mouth drops open. How could your car insurance rate be so high when everything about you is so perfect?

There’s typically only one answer to this question: your credit history and score.

Wait, wait, wait. What, you might be wondering, does my credit have to do with my IL car insurance rate. I’m buying insurance, not the car itself. Why does that even matter?

It matters for a number of reasons. One simple to explain one would be that if you have a good credit score, then it tells car insurance companies that you are a reliable customer who will probably pay on time and maintain her responsibility with the company. If you have a bad credit score, it doesn’t send that message.

However, the part that really affects your car insurance rate is what the car insurance companies call your insurance risk score. This is determined using information from your credit report, usually pertaining to whether or not you pay your bills on time. If you have a bad insurance risk score, then you’re probably going to have a bad car insurance rate. The reason for this is that, according to research, policy holders who have bad credit file more claims, so they are considered to be more high risk than others.

If you aren’t sure whether or not you should be put into this category and get a high car insurance rate, order a copy of your credit report and check for inaccuracies and fake accounts. You can protect yourself from credit ruin and identity theft and also work toward a good IL car insurance rate.

How To Handle Your Auto Insurance Claim Check

Reader question:

Does it make any difference to your car insurance claims check if you’re still paying off your car?

Susan

Great question, Susan.

It sure does make a difference if you’re still paying off your car, and it adds a twist to the whole third party first party dynamic and makes the whole process a lot longer and more frustrating in most cases. In some cases, you won’t have any hassle. For example, we recently got into a fender bender with another guy and filed a claim with his car insurance company. They repaired the car, gave us a rental car, we were in and out in a couple of days and all I had to do was give a call to my car dealership. Very easy, but not always the case.

In many cases what you will have to do is contact the institution that is financing your car, and they might have to send someone from the bank out to inspect it and verify the damages. You’re going to be getting your car insurance claims check with both your name and the lien holder’s name, so you really have no options here because you can’t get anything done until they endorse the check. This might take a few weeks.

Most of the time you just take your car up to the lot and have them look at it. Then, later on, you will have to send the bill of services that you received from the mechanic, along with photos of your car now that it is repaired, and the check ready to be signed. If all is well, then they will endorse the check and send it back to you and you can go on your merry little way.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

When Should You File a Car Insurance Claim

Reader question:

When should I file a car insurance claim?

Alyssa

Excellent question, Alyssa.

Your car insurance policy may say that you have to call them up immediately if your vehicle so much as lightly ticks your mail box, but that doesn’t mean that it’s so. As the coach said in Waterboy, “What mama don’t know won’t hurt her,” and the same philosophy (if you want to call it that) goes for your car insurance company. In fact, some claims, if they are reported to your car insurance company, could actually hurt you.

The reason that your car insurance company wants you to tell them about every little nick, scratch, and bump is because they want to avoid any kinds of fraudulent claims for damages that weren’t incurred in any accident you may later claim. This is understandable, but Belvidere IL car insurance law does not require it, so you can be the judge of your own intentions.

So how do you know when to file a claim and when not to? Well, the standards that I will go by would be:

• If someone is hurt, nothing else matters. You need to call your car insurance company and file a claim.
• If your damages are under the amount of your deductible, then there is no need to file a claim.

If you file a claim when it is unnecessary, then you could risk some consequences, such as having your car insurance policy canceled or not renewed at the end of your policy term. To find out what the requirements are for a company to be able to cancel your claim, call the department of insurance and ask.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

Minimum Required Auto Insurance Coverage in Illinois

Reader question:

What is the minimum required auto insurance coverage in Illinois?

Amy

Great question, Amy.

Illinois auto insurance law is somewhere in the middle when it comes to the harshness of enforcement. While the fines are high when you get caught without insurance for your car, you don’t have such a large chance of being caught. The reason for this is that IL insurance does not have an automatic insurance verification system that involves communication between the department of motor vehicles and insurance companies and allows the red flagging of any vehicle identification number that is without insurance. At the same time, Illinois auto insurance law is not completely lax, because there are more ways to get caught than simply being pulled over by a random police officer.

That way is through the insurance verification system, which affects only five percent of drivers in Illinois every year. Of course, it is a random selection of drivers, and if you receive the notice that you have been selected to verify, then you have to send in proof of verification or you could be fined and have your registration suspended.

There are three basic types of coverage that you are required to have under IL insurance law, and those are:

• $20,000 bodily injury liability for one person
• $40,000 bodily injury liability for multiple people
• $15,000 property damage liability

If you get caught without insurance, then you will have to go to court to prove that you have it. If you can show an IL insurance card or some other proof of insurance, then you are off the hook. If not, then not only will you have to fork over five hundred dollars in fines, but it will cost you another hundred to get your registration back.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

Car insurance in Chicago

Some areas in Chicago are dangerous, so if you want to get a good deal on car insurance, then it is necessary for you to make sure that you protect your car properly from theft. Most of the time, if you do this, then your company for car insurance will give you some kind of anti theft device discount. However, in order to get this discount, you have to get the right kind of anti theft device. The ones that come with discounts for car insurance in Chicago are often the most secure.

• Passive or active?
  • A passive anti theft device is one that comes on as soon as you turn off the ignition. Most companies that sell car insurance in Chicago will only give you a discount for this type of device, because they don’t want to trust you with arming the device and possibly not doing it every time.
  • An active anti theft device has to be turned on by you every time you leave the car. These are less secure and are usually not accepted by companies that sell car insurance in Chicago.
• What kind?
  • An immobilizing device is the kind of anti theft device that most car insurance companies want to see and will give you a discount for. There are many kinds of immobilizing device.
    • Kill switch.
    • Fuel disabler.
    • Smart key.
    • and more.
  • There are other kinds of anti theft devices as well, such as alarms and decals and tracking systems. A few of these might get you a discount from a company that sells car insurance in Chicago, but the sure fire route is with the immobilizing device.

Along with an anti theft device, you should also practice a bit of common sense. Combine the two and you should have no problem getting a good rate on car insurance in Chicago.

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