One Reason EV Owners Pay Higher Insurance Rates

[ElectrifyingMe25]

This is a YouTube video that documents a man's fight to save his F150 Lightning Flash from getting declared totaled. This fight was the result of an undercarriage protection plate getting slightly bent in an accident when the owner ran off the road. The battery was totally protected by great Ford enginerring design. This happened in Canada. It's a very interesting story of great engineering vs. Incompetent insurance companies.

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[mr.Magoo]

The other scenario would be that they say "eh, it looks alright"

Runs some internal tests and it all seems fine, but internally there is some damage that can't be caught at that time and it could even be unrelated to the initial accident. Fast forward a month or two and the Smith Family is out driving and the battery for one reason or another catches fire and somehow the vehicle ends up off the road killing and everyone onboard.

Imagine the headlines and the gazillion dollar lawsuit that follows.

Sometimes it isn't about what makes practical sense, sometimes it's just about risk mitigation and liability.

 

[hturnerfamily]

I think the last line to your post should more appropriately read " ...Incompetent ASSUMPTIONS "

as an insurance agent, and, actually someone with common sense, there is no insurance company on the planet that is going to 'total loss' a vehicle that they can pay out less to have repaired ...

They also probably have many more 'facts' than you are giving them credit for...

and there's probably much more to this story than you are telling...

 

[hturnerfamily]

also, there is no data or facts that show that 'ev owners' pay more to insure their vehicles, just because they are 'EVs' ...

it looks like this truck owner, though, may pay more because of, well, incompetent driving.

 

[Heliian]

The insurance cartels are strictly in it for the profits. They are going to use every excuse to charge more. Oh its an ev, oh it's made from aluminium. Oh its an f150, oh its a 4 door pickup.

Want to save money, just install this totally not a data harvesting "monitor" so we know you're driving safely.

My new insurance agent came back this year saying I can save a few dollars a month by installing a fancy gps tracker. I said, great! I'll install one! Oh no you can't do it, you have to pay our sole source supplier for the equipment and install. Gfy.

 

[JTWIRE55]

This is a YouTube video that documents a man's fight to save his F150 Lightning Flash from getting declared totaled. This fight was the result of an undercarriage protection plate getting slightly bent in an accident when the owner ran off the road. The battery was totally protected by great Ford enginerring design. This happened in Canada. It's a very interesting story of great engineering vs. Incompetent insurance companies.

This particular video was from Canada, they have different rules than the United States.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

Our insurance went down when we got our first ev and down again when we went all ev.

 

[Calvin H-C]

I'm in the Toronto area of Canada and I can say that our EV insurance rates are NOT higher than ICE vehicles.

There is a specific "EV" discount listed just like the "winter tire" discount.

The first year we had the 2017 FFE, we also had a 2013 ICE Focus SE. We thought the ICE would continue to be driven 25,000 km per year while the FFE would only be driven 16.

After one year, we found that was reversed and when we had that reversed on the insurance policy, the total rate dropped by about $20. Not a huge difference, but this slight reduction was for more use of the year-old EV with full replacement coverage over the five-year old ICE car without full replacement coverage.

 

[Mal106]

I think the last line to your post should more appropriately read " ...Incompetent ASSUMPTIONS "

as an insurance agent, and, actually someone with common sense, there is no insurance company on the planet that is going to 'total loss' a vehicle that they can pay out less to have repaired ...

They also probably have many more 'facts' than you are giving them credit for...

and there's probably much more to this story than you are telling...

That is certainly the other point of view but if you saw that video and the one where the damage was done it is likely that the "common sense" point of view might well be the video author's. EV trust and knowledge will come but it's still in its infancy. Significally, the company in question is a government entity with a solid monopoly and little or no profit incentive.

 

[flabrent]

Before buying my Lightning I had quotes all over the map. From a high of over $8K per year to a low of $1,600 per year.
The $8K quote came from Auto-Owners Insurance who is now the former carrier of my companies commercial coverages.

 

[PrimeRisk]

The insurance cartels are strictly in it for the profits. They are going to use every excuse to charge more. Oh its an ev, oh it's made from aluminium. Oh its an f150, oh its a 4 door pickup.

Want to save money, just install this totally not a data harvesting "monitor" so we know you're driving safely.

My new insurance agent came back this year saying I can save a few dollars a month by installing a fancy gps tracker. I said, great! I'll install one! Oh no you can't do it, you have to pay our sole source supplier for the equipment and install. Gfy.

Years ago I fell for the Big Brother treatment with Allstate as they promised "up to 40%" savings if I complied. They were the OBD-II plug-in type and they had to be installed on every vehicle on the policy. (We had 4 vehicles for 2 people)

At our first renewal, we got our "savings" report.

• Vehicle 1: My car. No actual reduction in the premium. Apparently I already had the best rate possible. Admittedly my daily commute was only a few miles to the light rail station on secondary streets, so not much chance to get in trouble.
• Vehicle 2: My wife's car had about a 5% increase. Her commute was about 50 miles a day through town and apparently she has a habit of breaking hard plus a little speeding.
• Vehicle 3: SUV we use mostly for pleasure and cross-country trips. 10% discount as we hadn't taken a cross-country trip during the evaluation period and had been driven few miles and only on the weekend. A+!
• Vehicle 4: Old work truck we use for working on our rentals, hauling large things, and pulling a camper. The premium doubled. The was a WTF moment as we had barely driven the vehicle due to not needing it for anything.

Our overall renewal went up about $300. I called my agent and he had no idea what the problem was, so had to refer me to Allstate directly. Apparently since we had driven Vehicle 4 less than 300 miles over the 6 months, we were defaulted to the worst rate category. I argued that treating a vehicle that hasn't been driven, yet has full-coverage paid for it, was insane as it actually has the lowest risk of being involved in any accident. Their response: Bummer.

To make things worse, we 'd be rated like this for a year, so even if we drove it enough to be rated for the next 6 months, the penalty rate would stay for the next renewal.

We said GFY too. We moved our house, 4 vehicles, $2M PUP, and 13 rentals from Allstate to SafeCo. My agent was spitting nails at losing all of our business.

 

[ElectrifyingMe25]

Years ago I fell for the Big Brother treatment with Allstate as they promised "up to 40%" savings if I complied. They were the OBD-II plug-in type and they had to be installed on every vehicle on the policy. (We had 4 vehicles for 2 people)

At our first renewal, we got our "savings" report.

• Vehicle 1: My car. No actual reduction in the premium. Apparently I already had the best rate possible. Admittedly my daily commute was only a few miles to the light rail station on secondary streets, so not much chance to get in trouble.
• Vehicle 2: My wife's car had about a 5% increase. Her commute was about 50 miles a day through town and apparently she has a habit of breaking hard plus a little speeding.
• Vehicle 3: SUV we use mostly for pleasure and cross-country trips. 10% discount as we hadn't taken a cross-country trip during the evaluation period and had been driven few miles and only on the weekend. A+!
• Vehicle 4: Old work truck we use for working on our rentals, hauling large things, and pulling a camper. The premium doubled. The was a WTF moment as we had barely driven the vehicle due to not needing it for anything.

Our overall renewal went up about $300. I called my agent and he had no idea what the problem was, so had to refer me to Allstate directly. Apparently since we had driven Vehicle 4 less than 300 miles over the 6 months, we were defaulted to the worst rate category. I argued that treating a vehicle that hasn't been driven, yet has full-coverage paid for it, was insane as it actually has the lowest risk of being involved in any accident. Their response: Bummer.

To make things worse, we 'd be rated like this for a year, so even if we drove it enough to be rated for the next 6 months, the penalty rate would stay for the next renewal.

We said GFY too. We moved our house, 4 vehicles, $2M PUP, and 13 rentals from Allstate to SafeCo. My agent was spitting nails at losing all of our business.

Thanks for sharing. Ironically, we just left Safeco (Liberty Mutual) who was raping me with ridiculous increases. I had been a loyal customer for years, and then my wife had an accident. They also raised our house insurance.

We switched to Allstate and halved our premium. They temped us with the monitor, but I'm not that kind of guy. I believe a company only offers such a device if it benefits them.

I bet Allstate will raise our rates after the first year. I had friend tell me they switch insurance every year to maintain a low premium.

Does anyone else have a strategy for dealing with high insurance rates.

Sometimes I think I'd be better off to self insure our house with an investment account. I'd be money ahead. Between taxes and insurance, how's a man supposed to get ahead.

 

[Mal106]

Yes those insurance companies don't build office buildings, hire employees, including lawyers by paying out more than they take in. I have always been of the opinion that, if you can afford the loss, you are better off self insuring. The notable exception is liability where a lawyer may be involved.

 

[davehu]

I traded in my 2012 Avalanche (insurance: $90/mth) for my '23 Lariat. Insurance: $102/mth

 

[02Reaper]

Before buying my Lightning I had quotes all over the map. From a high of over $8K per year to a low of $1,600 per year.
The $8K quote came from Auto-Owners Insurance who is now the former carrier of my companies commercial coverages.

Who did you end up going with? I currently have auto owners for the truck and my wife's Camry. Insurance on her car which is 10 years old is almost as much as the lightning. I've called and complained but gotten nowhere. I'm about to jump ship on them.

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