Car Insurance Companies

• Check Consumer Complaint Ratios. Different state insurance department web sites will have detailed information on their sites that illustrates the amount of complaints received in comparison to their competitors per $1 million in premiums. Simply access the department site for the state in which you live and type complaint ratios in the site’s search engine to find the complaint ratio information for a specified carrier within your state.
  
  
• Check the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) site and look at their insurance comparison of auto insurance costs. http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/. Once you get to this web site, simply type ‘insurance’ in the Search engine to find the newest report available. This report will show you a comparison of over 1,000 vehicles and the average amounts paid on a monthly basis. Look at the rates of the company you are considering. Do their rates fall close to the amounts listed by the NHTSA?
  
  *Note: This report will often only have vehicles listed that fall between certain years (i.e. 2006-2008.)
  
  
• Look for automobile insurance companies with a strong financial outlook. Have they been around for a long time? Are they growing? Licensing and financial data can be accessed through the Consumer Information Source (https://eapps.naic.org/cis/). The National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) has provided this tool online free of charge to help consumers to make a wise decision when they purchase car insurance.
  
  
• Do they have good customer service? In today’s world, customer service is everything. An insurance carrier should make you feel confident in their abilities to help you with all of your insurance needs and handle it so you feel good about what is happening. Good customer service is a reflection of the dedication a company will have to you as an individual policy holder.
  
  
• Are they honest and upfront with you about the specifics of your policy? Given your circumstances, the company you choose should be willing to educate you on the type of coverage you will need as well as provide additional voluntary options.
  
  
• Don’t be afraid to ask friends or family members if they have had experience with a specific insurance carrier. You may find out information, either good or bad, that a national report will not provide.
  
  
• Availability. Will they have someone available to answer your questions when you have them? Many insurance companies now provide a 24 hour hotline that is available to motorists in the event of an emergency.
  
  
• How quickly do they handle their claims? Be fair. Some claims will take longer than others simply because of the nature of the claim, but if a claim takes more than 4 days to process, you may want to start looking somewhere else.
  
  *Note: This does not necessarily mean that the claim will be resolved within this timeframe, but it should be processed fairly quickly. The faster an insurance company can process and resolve a claim, the more money it saves them.