- September 24, 2014
- Posted by: admin
- Categories: Auto Insurance, blog, Driver Info, Insurance Claims, Insurance Coverages, Miscellaneous
All About Auto Insurance Fraud in Massachusetts
Why is Your Insurance So Much?
You work hard for your money, right? Therefore, to make the money you are paying to the insurance company really pay off – when you need it – it is very important that you be upfront and honest at all times with the insurance company – otherwise if you have a claim and they find out you have been not honest about aspects of your policy – they will view it as auto insurance fraud and can then deny your claim and all the money you paid for insurance will have been wasted.
To protect yourself go with the biggest company in the state and call us to get your Commerce Auto Insurance Quote.
Insurance fraud is a big problem. It makes the rates for us all much higher than they should be. And it unnecessarily causes people to be denied claims solely because they misrepresented information to the insurance company.
Unfortunately, about a third of Massachusetts drivers have omitted information or supplied false information to their car insurance providers. Drivers under age 30, who pay the most for car insurance, were three times more likely to submit incorrect information than drivers over 50.
What is Insurance Fraud?
Among the drivers misrepresenting information the most common were:
• Annual mileage
• Where the car is parked
• Names of drivers
• History of tickets or accidents
• Gaps in insurance coverage
• School grades, or teen driver’s grades
• Anti-theft devices
• Primary type of use (such as business, school or work)
• Marital status
• How long they’d been licensed
As an example, the address where a car is parked at night greatly influences the car insurance rates you pay. A good driver in a 2010 Honda Accord with a clean record and no claims would pay about $700 a year for full coverage in Palmer – the same driver would pay about $1200 in Springfield, only 10 miles away. And people know this which is why they commit the fraud – but in the long run it is not worth it.
More than 40 percent of those who misrepresented information said their insurance company eventually discovered the bad information. Of those who were caught:
• 33.5 % said their claim was denied
• 31.5 % said their premiums went up
• 25.4 % said their policy was canceled
• 7.6 % said they were sued for fraud
• 2 % said nothing happened.
Another example is your friend borrows your car and wrecks it. The insurance company’s “undisclosed driver report” turns up evidence in the RMV that he lived at your address. At that point, the company could deny your claim altogether, pay the claim but charge you back premiums as if the driver had been included all along, or cancel your policy because of misrepresentation. Either way, they are not good conclusions.
When you get a quote for car insurance you make “representations” to the insurance agent about things like where you live and who are your drivers – being dishonest about these two areas can cause problems with these insurance companies.
Bottom line?
With car insurance stay away from auto insurance fraud. Always tell the truth about your situation and then you have the best chance possible to have your claim paid quickly and to your satisfaction.
Good luck with this.
Call my office if you have any questions