Monday, August 24, 2009

Auto Insurance Rate -- Tips To Qualify For Cheaper

By Chimezirim Odimba

If you choose to pay your premiums monthly, you'll attract more expensive rates. The ads may show that monthly paymenst are less stressful but what you're not told is how much more you pay for this..

Every check that is processed attracts a charge. All through a year, your monthly checks would be processed differently since they are all separate transactions. You'll then have to pay the sum of twelve transaction fees..

Besides there are also administrative costs that come with the monthly payment option. For example, it costs some money to send payment notices each and every month.

The additional administrative cost to your insurer is ultimately borne by you (that's in addition to their own profit margin for giving you such a "stressless" alternative).

The longer you stick with the same insurer the more you stand to gain for two reasons: The long term discount and accident forgiveness. Some insurers will give you up to 5% in discounts once you've been with them for up to three years while others will give you such a discount only when you've stayed for up to five.

Most insurers will also not raise the rates of a long standing policy holder if they make only just one claim. These are all incentives for you to stay with them for as long as possible. The longer you stay, the more you'll save.

But it will only be right for me to also point out that in spite of these incentives, you might actually gain more if you switch to another insurer.

"Pimping your ride" does NOT help if you want lower rates. Things like changing your tires to bigger ones than specified by the manufacturer, adding equipment that will increase your car's horse-power will cost you a lot more. Any changes to your vehicle takes your rates up.

Get Your Free Auto Insurance Quotes Now And Save!

Young drivers are statistically very bad risks. Even in this age bracket, a 23-year old driver will pay much less than a 17 year old all other things being equal.

So you'll do well to NOT place your teenage driver on your policy. It will drive it up by a huge margin. You can discuss with your agent about signing an exclusion form so that your teen driver can have his/her own auto policy.

If a teen is keen on driving then then should be made responsible for at least the cost of their auto insurance. An addition argument in favor of this is that your teen will be more willing to take measures to reduce what he or she pays. The full implication of this is that your teen will be a lot safer as they'd do their best to avoid inflating their rates.

Add-ons like towing raise your premium without giving you as much value as using a towing service. By the way, your credit card might already offer this as a benefit so check.

Even if yours does NOT add this kind of service, a dedicated towing service from a third party will serve you better and save you more than adding towing to your auto insurance policy.

And...

You might save several hundreds of dollars by simply getting and comparing quotes from at least five quotes sites. And, it will require only a total of 25 minutes.