Removing car insurance temporarily

[TorqueDog]

As a first step, I would just change the vehicle to pleasure use and lower your estimated mileage per year.

Things like deductibles and coverage (eg: liability, glass waiver, rental car) can also be tweaked, but there are often coverage parameters dictated by your finance/lease agreement (if applicable) that you'll need to adhere to in order to stay compliant. For example, you might be required to carry a minimum of $2,000,000 third-party liability and a maximum deductible for $500. Your mileage may vary.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by rvd123

Which insurance company?

Started giving Sonnet a try last year after getting annoyed at always having to phone my broker to make simple changes

Originally Posted by transplant99

Also it was pointed out that if the vehicle taken off the policy was 10 or more years old, it would require a full inspection to be re-added.\

That's pretty scummy of them, I've never had an insurance company not waive that for me if I was an existing customer/they had previously insured that vehicle

[Ben Dover]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

With us not using our vehicles as much right now and looking for ways to minimize unnecessary expenses, I’m considering removing insurance from one of our vehicles. Now, and when I have done this in the last, insurers seem reluctant to actually take all insurance off, but instead keep fire and theft on it, which then minimizes the savings (it’s about 40% of the policy cost).

The car will be kept in the garage, and really I think I’m fine taking the very low risk of it being burned up or stolen.

So I’m wondering what others thoughts or experiences are on if it is reasonable to fully remove it, then reinsure it once things get back to normal. Or if is should keep the partial coverage on it for reasons I’m unaware.

We do have another vehicle that would stay insured in my name.

I work as an insurance broker and can give advice to the best of my knowledge:

1. Payment Deferrals - all the companies we write business with have been flexible with making payment arrangements at this time. You can either ask for a 30 day extension or get your next payment deferred and applied equally to all future payments. The other option is moving the withdrawal date to the end of the month, for e.g. - if your payment comes out on Apr 5th, get this payment deferred and move the withdrawal date for all future payments to the end of the month (30th, 31st) to enjoy an extra three weeks of no payments. (Tip - be careful with doing this with Wawanesa, because their billing system is terrible and you can get double-charged.)

2. Reducing Usage - probably the best way to save premium is reducing the annual and commute kms for all vehicles on your policy. Get them to reduce annual kms to 5000 and commute to 0 (provided you are not driving to work daily). This should bring about significant savings but remember to increase them back to what they were to avoid any trouble in case of any future claims.

3. Reducing Coverages - Parking insurance (or fire & theft) is still the best option for people with multiple vehicles on their policy. Since most of us are only driving one vehicle for now, leave the cheapest insured vehicle on the policy as your daily driver and tell your broker to put the rest on parking insurance. You can delete the vehicle too and always request them to give you a quote for either, but there are a few things to worry about when you completely take the vehicle off the policy: first is no coverage in case of any loss, second is you will lose multi-vehicle discounts (for e.g. if you delete the 2nd vehicle, the first one will become more expensive), third is when you try to re-add the vehicle in the future, you will be rated at what the cost of insuring the vehicle is at that time, not what it was at the time the vehicle was originally added).

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I do this every year for my summer car. It's easy and takes literally 10 minutes (assuming your insurer doesn't keep you on hold for an hour). Saves me a few hundred bucks a year, so I think it's worth it.

[Ryan Coke]

Corsi, do you do parking insurance or completely take it off for summer ?

Ben Dover, thanks for your info. I was told even with going to parking insurance I would lose my multi vehicle discount, which of course reduced any savings I was getting. And your last point “you will be rated at what the cost of insuring the vehicle is at that time, not what it was at the time the vehicle was originally added”....can you clarify what you mean by that?

Thanks again.

[Ben Dover]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Corsi, do you do parking insurance or completely take it off for summer ?

Ben Dover, thanks for your info. I was told even with going to parking insurance I would lose my multi vehicle discount, which of course reduced any savings I was getting. And your last point “you will be rated at what the cost of insuring the vehicle is at that time, not what it was at the time the vehicle was originally added”....can you clarify what you mean by that?

Thanks again.

Yes, parking insurance on the 2nd vehicle will still increase the insurance on the 1st vehicle but this increase will be cheaper than deleting the vehicle. Secondly, since insurance rates have been going up significantly in AB over the past year and we expect them to keep increasing in to the next year, the cost to insure the vehicle in the future will be higher than what it is today. Once your insurance renews, the price to insure the car is locked in for the whole year, if you try to delete the vehicle and re-add it later, they will charge you the now higher-price to insure the same vehicle. Obviously this will vary from company to company but hope that explains it a little better.

Also I forgot to mention in my first post that most companies have waived NSF fees in case you miss a payment.

[chummer]

Originally Posted by Ben Dover

Yes, parking insurance on the 2nd vehicle will still increase the insurance on the 1st vehicle but this increase will be cheaper than deleting the vehicle. Secondly, since insurance rates have been going up significantly in AB over the past year and we expect them to keep increasing in to the next year, the cost to insure the vehicle in the future will be higher than what it is today. Once your insurance renews, the price to insure the car is locked in for the whole year, if you try to delete the vehicle and re-add it later, they will charge you the now higher-price to insure the same vehicle. Obviously this will vary from company to company but hope that explains it a little better.

Also I forgot to mention in my first post that most companies have waived NSF fees in case you miss a payment.

With way fewer cars on the road, accidents and payouts by insurance companies should be way down. Yet you're predicting insurance rates to rise?

Makes no sense but not surprising.

[fundmark19]

Originally Posted by chummer

With way fewer cars on the road, accidents and payouts by insurance companies should be way down. Yet you're predicting insurance rates to rise?

Makes no sense but not surprising.

Insurance companies are only in year 1 of raising rates to get profitable in Alberta. It will be a couple of years before they find that perfect mix of rates and increases stop. Every car produced continues to cost more in repairs even though the safety features haven't produced less accidents.

Therefor future us will pay more in premiums

[GGG]

I just went to fire/theft on my vehicle with Meloche. It was actually cheaper to leave fire/theft on it because of the multi vehicle discount they use.

[White Out 403]

Originally Posted by Torture

If nothing else you can tell your insurance company you're no longer using it to commute to work and update the estimated mileage per year and save a few bucks.

I did that. With me working from home it was worthwhile.

[#22]

I change my car to parking insurance every year from end of Oct to March / April. Saves about $60 / month (AMA).

[Titan]

Originally Posted by Ben Dover

Finally my time to shine and be useful for CP after 11 years. I am an insurance broker and can give advice to the best of my knowledge:

1. Payment Deferrals - all the companies we write business with have been flexible with making payment arrangements at this time. You can either ask for a 30 day extension or get your next payment deferred and applied equally to all future payments. The other option is moving the withdrawal date to the end of the month, for e.g. - if your payment comes out on Apr 5th, get this payment deferred and move the withdrawal date for all future payments to the end of the month (30th, 31st) to enjoy an extra three weeks of no payments. (Tip - be careful with doing this with Wawanesa, because their billing system is terrible and you can get double-charged.)

2. Reducing Usage - probably the best way to save premium is reducing the annual and commute kms for all vehicles on your policy. Get them to reduce annual kms to 5000 and commute to 0 (provided you are not driving to work daily). This should bring about significant savings but remember to increase them back to what they were to avoid any trouble in case of any future claims.

3. Reducing Coverages - Parking insurance (or fire & theft) is still the best option for people with multiple vehicles on their policy. Since most of us are only driving one vehicle for now, leave the cheapest insured vehicle on the policy as your daily driver and tell your broker to put the rest on parking insurance. You can delete the vehicle too and always request them to give you a quote for either, but there are a few things to worry about when you completely take the vehicle off the policy: first is no coverage in case of any loss, second is you will lose multi-vehicle discounts (for e.g. if you delete the 2nd vehicle, the first one will become more expensive), third is when you try to re-add the vehicle in the future, you will be rated at what the cost of insuring the vehicle is at that time, not what it was at the time the vehicle was originally added).

thanks.

Could you address whether your home insurance will cover fire loss if it is parked in the garage? Also, how long does an at fault accident stay on your 'record' for insurance purposes?

I just did this for the wife and daughter's cars. My wife's premium went from $198/mth to $19 for parking insurance. Johnson insurance. Also, there is a discount for winter tires I didn't know about so if you call in ask about that.

[ken0042]

Originally Posted by Titan

Could you address whether your home insurance will cover fire loss if it is parked in the garage?

I cannot see your home insurance covering an uninsured vehicle. I would also be concerned about if the vehicle itself did catch fire. If the vehicle did not have fire insurance on it- would you run into trouble in getting your house covered?

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Corsi, do you do parking insurance or completely take it off for summer ?

I still have fire / theft / comprehensive. It's a considerable discount.

[zamler]

Originally Posted by ken0042

I cannot see your home insurance covering an uninsured vehicle. I would also be concerned about if the vehicle itself did catch fire. If the vehicle did not have fire insurance on it- would you run into trouble in getting your house covered?

I asked my insurance (Belairdirect) about this any vehicle on the property would not be covered under home insurance.

[Leeman4Gilmour]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Thanks to everyone for their thoughts.



So was this a full suspension? Like to zero coverage? That is what I am thinking of doing.

Correct