Let’s start off in New Hampshire. The first question is whether the design standards in modern vehicles make annual safety checks unnecessary. If you said, “yes”, you are with the thirty states that do not require any safety checks. The theory seems to be responsible drivers maintain their vehicles and are not a hazard on the roads. If there’s an accident, they pay more for their insurance – it’s a stick and carrot approach to social responsibility except it forces up the premium rates for all drivers. In states where there are annual checks, vehicles are better maintained, there are fewer accidents, and drivers pay lower rates. New Hampshire has just decided to move from one to two-year inspections. Now there will be thousands more vehicles on the road with poor brakes and defective front ends. Guess what will happen to the premium rates.

In Mississippi, there’s a bill to enforce the mandate by requiring drivers to produce proof of insurance before the tax collector issues a tag. Governor Haley Barbour is currently considering whether the new database will be open to the police to check the status of all drivers. If he does sign this bill into law, it will potentially reduce everyone’s insurance premium rates. The more people are forced into paying for the basic minimum liability policy, the less the law-abiding people will pay.

In New Brunswick, the Insurance Board is refusing to release a report into whether local insurers have been overcharging drivers for the last seven years. The lawmakers established an arms-length board in 2004 but, for some reason, they are less than enthusiastic about forcing disclosure of this board’s investigation. In the meantime, New Brunswickers continue to pay higher than average premium rates. Read the rest of this entry

Whenever you start thinking about insurance, the first thought tends to be about the risks of different types of traffic accident or the ways in which you might lose the vehicle. You make lists of collisions, vandals writing their names on your bodywork, thieves driving the vehicle away, floods carrying your car off, and so on. Then you get to all those other personal factors like where you live, what your credit score is, and so on. After a while, you wonder how you can hope to find cheaper cover when, so often, whether you make a claim or the amount of the damage has nothing to do with the way you drive. Now add in the fact that you have no control over the cost of gas or of how much the body shop will charge to repair any damage and there’s a temptation to give up. Except that’s a bit negative.

No matter what you may fear, insurance is really all about whether you are going to make a claim. Those who have the best track record, have the lowest premium rates. So don’t give up. If you have a defensive style of driving and avoid all the most obvious situations in which you may get into an accident, the insurer will reward you over time. Then you ask whether there’s any way in which you can speed up time.

Welcome to the brave new world of technology. Thanks to the development of all our cell phones and other mobile computers, there’s a way of continuously transmitting information from your vehicle. Manufacturers are now fitting some clever chips to monitor exactly how your vehicle is performing. If something starts to go wrong, the vehicle displays warning messages and can signal your usual mechanic with details. This covers everything from whether your tires are properly inflated, the level of wear in the brakes, and so on. Add in the GPS transmitters so that, if someone steals your car, you have a reasonable chance of finding it, and the package is genuinely useful. Read the rest of this entry

Insuring a car may seem like a serious challenge to those who are dealing with it for the first time and don’t know much about the principles behind this form of insurance. This often results in wrong decision when buying a new policy and paying for the things that aren’t really necessary. Afterwards, people start claiming that vehicle insurance is there only to rip off their wallets and insurance companies are forcing money out of their clients for nothing. Surely, it’s far from the truth and not constructive at all, since all it takes is just to learn the basics of vehicle insurance and keep them in mind when looking for a policy. So what are these essentials that any insurance shopper should base on during his or her shopping process?

Vehicle insurance is mandatory

That’s probably what just any driver knows and that’s really good since driving without any insurance can result in substantial fines and even license revocation. But what most drivers aren’t aware of is that the only mandatory portion of any policy is the third party liability coverage comprising property damage and bodily injury liability. All other types of coverage are optional and depending on the amount of coverage you get with your policy the rates may vary substantially. That’s why you should always know what’s included into your policy. Read the rest of this entry

What’s in a word? Well, perhaps in this case, it’s the difference between insurance cover and no cover. Let’s start with the straightforward version which we might call a motor scooter. This is a two-wheeled, low-powered version of a motorbike and, despite very real safety concerns, their number has been growing steadily on our roads since we broke through the price barrier of $3 per gallon of gas. The reason is simple. It’s not difficult to get 60 or more miles to the gallon on a scooter. That’s rather better than the average vehicle. Add in the fact you will also save dramatic amounts on the auto insurance and it looks a good deal. The only problem is the number of accidents. Drivers seem to have great difficulty is actually seeing these nippy little things as they whizz in and out of traffic.

Changing the subject, you can’t avoid knowing we are facing an epidemic of obesity. Perhaps equally as serious is the increasing age of the population. As the boomers steadily pass the 60 mark, the average age is rising quite sharply. Those who work out these math sums tell us that, by 2025, there will be 66 million people aged 65 or more. Now let’s put together the picture by adding in the number of people who are born with disabilities or who are injured and therefore cannot walk around so easily. One of the things we pride ourselves on as Americans is our inventiveness. Knowing how many people might find it a challenge to move around the home or outside, there’s been a rush to develop scooters (for the record, the general term is an “electric mobility device”. They now come in a fairly standard four-wheel form, rather like a slimmed down golf cart and, in increasing numbers, you’re likely to see them on our roads and have to move out of their way on sidewalks and cycle paths.

The advantages of these machines are simple to list: you don’t need a license or registration to drive one, there are no rules requiring you to wear protective helmets, and they are very cheap to operate. All of which should suggest the key problem. Calling them scooters is not going to turn them into cars or bikes, and auto policies are not appropriate. Equally clear is the problem of dealing with them under the liability section of your home policy. Suppose a senior is distracted while riding down the sidewalk and crashes into a pedestrian. This is not the same as snow sliding off the roof and hospitalizing a passerby. For those who are interested in legal niceties, you also can’t be guilty of dui/dwi charges because you’re not actually driving. It’s an assisted form of walking. Read the rest of this entry