Common Ways To Mess Up Your Personal Insurance

People often call our office, because they are having serious problems with their homeowners, renters or auto insurance. These problems often involve an accident or loss that wasn’t covered, but could have been covered if our agency had been involved. Selecting your personal insurance can be one of the most important financial decisions you make. Personal insurance is there to protect your home, family and assets from loss.

Here are some common mistakes that people make:

1. Buy insurance online. Many people believe that all insurance policies and companies are the same. WRONG. Online policies require you to select the coverage. For example, someone buys their auto insurance online, but does not click the collision box. Later, they are in an accident where they are hit with thousands of dollars of uninsured damage. At TWS, we work with our clients to help them understand coverage, and make sure they are purchasing the coverage that they really need.
2. Sell their car to a relative, but still carry the insurance. This is a really bad idea. Often people have good intentions, but doing this puts the policyholder at risk. Also, in most cases the sale may invalidate the insurance.
3. Work for Uber. Unfortunately, your auto insurance will not provide any insurance if you use your personal vehicle as a cab, commercial delivery or “for a fee” service.
4. Rent without renters insurance. Even if you rent, you still may have $10,000 or more in personal property (TV, computers, clothes, jewelry, etc.). For a very little premium, renters insurance can protect your personal property.
5. Don’t pay premiums on time. People often think that insurance is like a utility bill and payments can be late. If payments are late, the insurance company has the right to cancel coverage.
6. Don’t add expensive jewelry to their policy. For example, if buy your wife a new ring and the value is over $2,000, you will want to add it to your policy. There are limitations for jewelry, so call our office for more information.
7. Start a home business. Running a home business is not automatically covered under personal insurance. Changes to the person’s policy will need to be made.
8. Change of marital status. If a person’s marital status changes then changes will need to be made to their insurance. If a loss occurs after a divorce, insurance payments can take much longer to figure out.
9. Use auto policy for every little scratch and dent. This will only drive up the person’s premiums.