When you get into an accident with an uninsured driver, then your minimum liability automobile insurance policy will not help you in the least towards your damages. In order to be covered in such an incident, you need to have uninsured motorist coverage.

As I’ve mentioned, the requirements for bodily injury liability under Georgia auto insurance law are pretty low, so in a bad accident it wouldn’t be too hard for the actual medical costs to go way over the amount of insurance that this person has. This is why under insured motorist coverage is also very necessary.

If a person only has twenty five thousand in bodily injury liability, and the damages are thirty thousand, then their car insurance company will pay for the first amount, and your own will pay for the remaining five thousand dollars. Depending on where you are at, the way this is handled could be different. For example, if  insurance law requires that under insured motorist coverage be added on, then it will happen much like this:

If your under insured motorist coverage is for, say sixty thousand dollars, and their bodily injury liability is twenty five thousand dollars, then the two amounts will be put together to make eighty five thousand dollars, and that will be your coverage.

However, in other areas they deduct. If this is the case with you, the with the above coverages, you would only have the sixty thousand dollars of coverage.

As for uninsured motorist coverage, it covers bodily injury as well, although there is no additional coverage to be added to it. If you want your damages to be fixed, then you should have collision coverage.

If there is more than one car on your insurance policy, then you can add more to your coverage by stacking your policies. So, instead of having sixty thousand dollars of coverage, you would have a hundred and twenty thousand.

If you don’t have the patience to read my post, then check out this video from YouTube about gap insurance. It does a pretty good job at explaining why you may need to add gap insurance coverage to your Georgia car insurance policy. If you’re still confused, let me break it down for you.

• Gap insurance is…

Gap insurance is the type of coverage that you add to your  car insurance policy to fill the gap between the actual cash value of your car and the amount that you actually owe on it. When you total your car, the amount that you own on it isn’t taken into mind when calculating what your claim payment will be, so this can be very important.

Right now I’m making payments on a 2007 Chrysler PT Cruiser. We owe about $16,500 on the car right now, but it’s only worth around $12,000. If we were to total that car today and we didn’t have gap insurance, then after our claim payment came through, we would be without a car and we would still owe over four thousand dollars on our car.

• Who requires it?

Gap insurance is only necessary to add to your  insurance coverage if you’re still making payments on a car. Most of the time, your financer or car dealership will require you to purchase gap insurance much like they require you to purchase comprehensive or collision insurance on your new vehicle. They do this to protect their investment.

In order to buy gap insurance, your insurance policy must already have collision and comprehensive coverage on it. You cannot purchase gap insurance otherwise.

The reason why people need gap insurance is because, unless you put a sizable down payment on a new car, then in the time soon after you have bought it you will be in an upside down loan, which means that you will owe more than the car is worth. This happens because new cars depreciate very rapidly.

Should I add comprehensive and collision coverage to my Georgia auto insurance policy? What is it anyway?

Gloria

Thank you for your question, Gloria.

Whether or not you add comprehensive and collision coverage to your Georgia auto insurance policy should depend on several factors. Before we cover those, though, let’s first look at what comprehensive and collision coverage are.

• Comprehensive coverage is…

Comprehensive coverage is the kind of coverage that takes care of damages that result from things that aren’t automobile accidents. For example, if you were living in New Orleans at the time of Hurricane Katrina, then any flood damage caused to your car would fall under your comprehensive coverage. This is because comprehensive coverage takes care of damage resulting from natural disasters.

It also takes care of damage that results from criminal activity. For example, if your car is stolen, then it will be replaced if you have comprehensive coverage. If your car is vandalized, then it will be repaired under your comprehensive coverage portion of your insurance policy.

• Collision coverage is…

Collision coverage is like property damage liability, except that instead of being for the person on the other end of your auto insurance accident, collision coverage takes care of damage caused to your own vehicle. This includes repairs if your vehicle is simply damaged, and the actual cash value if your vehicle is totaled.

Collision coverage also applies when you get into an accident that involves your own property. If you’re parked backwards in your driveway, say, and you put your car in reverse instead of drive by accident, and as a result back into your garage, then the damage to your garage and your car will be covered by your collision coverage.

• Why you need them (or don’t)…

Collision and comprehensive coverage can be very useful when you get into an accident or have your car stolen, but not every vehicle needs it. One of the quickest ways to cut the costs on your insurance premium is to drop your extra coverage, after all.

If you have a car that is old and not worth more than a thousand dollars, then you do not need comprehensive and collision auto insurance coverage. You will end up paying more for the coverage than your car is actually worth, and there’s no point in that.

If you are still buying a car, then you are probably required to have comprehensive and collision coverage. If you don’t, then you could end up paying for a vehicle that you no longer have if your car ends up totaled.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

I get so mixed up with my auto insurance. I have so many bills to pay each month and I just don’t have time to figure out how to lower my premium. What can I do?

Jack in Atlanta Georgia

Thank you for asking, Jack.

You know, there is actually a way that you can kill two bird with one stone, and lower the stress of multiple bills while also lowering your  auto insurance premium. This is pretty simple to do, and might take a few minutes of your time, but it will be extremely valuable in your future.

The key to a cheap, stress less, Atlanta Georgia auto insurance rate is to

• Combine, combine, combine!

The first thing you need to do, Jack, if look at each of the insurance companies that you are with, not just your auto insurance company. What kind of insurance do they offer? Many companies will offer life, home owner’s, and auto insurance, while some will only offer one kind of insurance. If you have the latter type holding your policies, then you need to ditch them and find a company that offers more.

Once you have decided on a good auto insurance company that also offers other types of insurance, you should buy all of your insurance policies through them. Not only will you essentially consolidate your insurance bills, making them easier to keep track of, but you will also lower your premium through the multiple policy discount that most companies offer.

• Join, join, join!

You don’t have to go it alone on your  insurance premium if you have another choice. If you have a fiancée, why not combine your policies into one  insurance policy? Same with a wife, or a roommate, or even a good friend. By adding someone else to your policy, you can save a lot of money on your  auto insurance premium, especially if that person is lower risk than you are.

Raise your deductible amount to $1,000. If you are a safe driver and have not had any accidents or claims in the last 5 years raising your deductible could be a super easy way to lower your annual premium.  Remember, you only pay the deductible amount when you file a claim with your insurance company and they pay that claim.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

To meet the minimum requirements for auto insurance in Georgia, you are required to have liability coverage. This type of coverage will take care of medical costs and property damage for the person to whom you cause damage in an accident which is your fault. You have to have:

• $25,000 of bodily injury coverage for each individual
• $50,000 cap for each accident if there is more than one person
• $25,000 for damage to property, such as a vehicle or a fence

These are the required amounts, but most companies that sell auto insurance in Georgia suggest that you stack on a little more than this amount of insurance, and the most commonly suggested amount is 100/300/100. You should remember when buying liability coverage for bodily injury that the two amounts do not combine. If you have fifty thousand of coverage for more than one person, then that is all that you get for a single accident, even if four people are injured. If only one person is injure, all they get is twenty five thousand. Considering the cost of medical bills in bad accidents, it makes sense to get more than that amount.

You need to have auto insurance, because the Georgia department of insurance can tell when you don’t. As a matter of fact, they have an online insurance verification system that keeps track of the insured and uninsured in the state. You can check your own status online to make sure that there aren’t any mistakes, although if you have only recently gotten a policy you should let a month pass before checking because it takes time.

If you go without auto insurance for 10 days or more, then your registration could be suspended. You would then have to pay $85 to restore. And although your auto insurance  can be verified online, you should still carry an insurance card in your vehicle for when you get pulled over.

If you want to lower your annual premiums, try raising your deductible amount to something like $1,000 or more.  You only pay when you file a claim with your insurance carrier and the savings over the long term could be substantial.

High deductible auto insurance is one of the prime examples of these catches, and many people avoid it because, they say, they are buying auto insurance to cover them. Why do they have insurance at all if they have to cover themselves?

Let me rewind. The deductible, first of all, is what you pay towards injuries and repairs and the like whenever you make a claim before your car insurance coverage kicks in. So, if I were to get into an accident and the damages to my car amounted to three thousand dollars, and I had a thousand dollar deductible (which I do), then I would pay that amount and the car insurance company would pay the other two thousand in repairs. The amount of the deductible never changes, even if the damages are only about five hundred dollars or fifty thousand. Deductibles are only paid when you are found to be at fault for the accident.

Raising your deductible from the bottom $250 can lower your auto insurance rate significantly, because it allows the car insurance company to pay less. Instead of avoiding this, raise it and start saving money for whenever you do get into an accident and have to pay a deductible. Most people only file a car insurance claim once every five years, so it’s likely that you won’t need your deductible much and you’ll probably save up way more than that amount by the time you have to pay it out if you just save the difference between your auto insurance rate with a low deductible and your auto insurance rate with a high deductible.

You can save a lot of money this way, and not just on your auto insurance rate. A couple of years ago, when I first raised my deductible, I started putting the money I was saving on my  auto insurance rate into a high interest savings account, and now let’s just say that it’s a lot bigger. So why wait? If you’re a safe driver and the likelihood of you getting into an at fault accident any time soon is pretty low, start saving money as soon as possible.

• Who does a car insurance agent represent?
  • The company. Car insurance agents work with several different companies in some cases to get you the best GA car insurance quote. For these companies, they attempt to get more customers with heavy coverage.
  • You. The car insurance agent also works for you, picking from his or her folder of companies to come to the one that will provide you with the cheapest GA car insurance quote.
• What kind of car insurance agents are there?
  • Captive car insurance agents. These agents work for only one company, so it is a lot like going through the company itself. They can only give you a GA car insurance quote from that one company.
  • Independent car insurance agents. These agents work for several companies, usually five or six, and can offer you a car insurance quote from each. This is better when you want help deciding which car insurance company to go with.

Before you start doing business with your agent, you need to find out what the fee for services will be. Some don’t charge any at all, because they get commission. However, if you don’t ask beforehand, that car insurance quote might be bigger than you expected.

Like car insurance companies, car insurance agents need to be licensed with the state. To determine if your agent is, you should check the Georgia Department of Insurance website. If they aren’t licensed, then they don’t have the right to provide you with an authoritative GA car insurance quote from the company they claim to be representing.

How do car insurance companies determine my auto insurance rate here in Georgia?

Paul

Thank you for your question, Paul.

There are so many factors that go into a single Georgia auto insurance quote, that I can’t even begin to address them all in a single post. A few decades ago, the factors could be counted on the fingers of one hand, but each year the process grows more complex. What I can do, though, is tell you about one thing that auto insurance companies look at to determine your insurance rates.

• Your CLUE report.

The majority of policy holders don’t have anything on their CLUE report, and this is mostly because the information only remains there for ten years. Unlike credit, which most of society uses constantly, the average insurance claim is filed only every half a decade or so.

The CLUE report is not connected to you yourself, but, much like your auto insurance policy, is connected to your vehicle. The CLUE report will have information on any past claims and repairs, and when you get a new car you can purchase a copy of your CLUE report from ChoicePoint. Since it does affect your insurance premium, it is probably a good idea to buy a CLUE report before you finalize the purchase of your car.

Like a credit report, sometimes CLUE reports contain mistakes. If you see one, you should contact ChoicePoint to have the offending note removed. This takes less than a month in the majority of cases. Unlike a credit report, though, if you have some information that would make your CLUE report look better, such as the installment of an anti theft device, then you can have that added to the report, making your auto insurance rates go down.

• Your CLUE report and your GA auto insurance company.

Once you are already with a company, they will almost never check your CLUE report again. Normally, these reports are looked at when you are getting a policy with a new  insurance company.

The CLUE report will not be used the same across the board by every insurance company, but the number of claims you have on it will certainly determine whether your rate goes up or down.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

I have tried everything, and I can’t find any Atlanta auto insurance company to insure me with an SR22 form. I really need to drive to get to work, but I don’t have a license! I can only beg rides off of people for so long. Help!

Graciela

Atlanta Georgia

You’ll have to look a little harder, Graciela.

SR22 insurance is a type of form that you are required to file through your Atlanta insurance company, for those who are new to the game, and it is only required after you have had your license suspended for some reason–such as drunk driving, speeding, or multiple traffic offenses. Having to file an SR22 form immediately pushes you into a higher risk group, which makes  insurance companies more reluctant to insure you. Some people with great records and a long history driving and insured with a certain company can weather the blow of an SR22 filing requirement, but for the rest of us being required to get an  insurance policy with the SR22 attachment can be a struggle.

However, Atlanta is a big city and there are certainly options, so the fact that you haven’t found something means that you are either too picky, or you aren’t looking in the right places.

• There are companies that will serve you.

Most people think that insurance companies are only interested in people with impeccable driving records, but that is not true. While some companies prefer this sort of driver, there are many of high risk specific companies who are happy to insure even the worst of the worst. Some of the bigger companies that operate nationwide, such as Progressive Insurance, are among these companies. If you can’t get an SR22 policy with a regular insurance company, then you need to start looking for high risk companies.

• Even if there aren’t…

Most of the time you will be able to find a insurance company that will be happy to insure you for the price of a mansion’s down payment, even with SR22 filing. However, in some cases nothing can be found, and in such cases it is necessary to turn to the state to be your guide.

If you can’t find a policy on the open market, then you will have to join the company high risk pool. This is a pool which high risk drivers join, and are then assigned by the state to participating companies. All companies that are licensed to sell insurance are required to participate, so you might find yourself with the very insurance company that denied your policy request in the first place.

The catch about assigned risk insurance, though, is that it is even more expensive than SR22 insurance from a high risk company. This should be a last resort.

Cheers,

Fashun Guadarrama.

How does taking defensive Driving class lowers my insurance premium? how do I enroll? I live in Georgia.

Sam

Thank you for asking Sam.

By taking a defensive driving class, your premiums may be lowered but this depends on the insurance company that you currently have since each companies has different policies to qualify for the discount. You may also check with the amount of the discount you might get if you take defensive driving class to lower your premiums from the cost of the course.

The state laws also requires an individual to take defensive driving course for point reduction on your driving record every five years. However this will still depends on the individual courts and the driving record since the court will determine if taking a driving course for ticket dismissal can be an option for you.

In Georgia, if your driving has been suspended due to DUI, you will be required to take a DUI course through a state approved school. The Georgia Department of Drivers Service can provide you all list of authorized schools that you can enrolled in.

You will also be required to take an assessment test for the amount of $75 before enrolling to the DUI school. Then after that, you will have to enroll to the 20-hour course and pay an amount of $250 which includes a book fee for $15. These fees are set by the state.

For teens, the Alcohol and Drug Awareness Program , a one hour session, is required for all drivers under the age of 18. You may be able to take a make up test if you failed the test at the end of the program.

You may check with the DDS to find out more information on where to take the defensive driving test.

Goodluck!

MariCAR