Insurance increases incoming

I just got a letter today from CAA insurance saying that my wife’s 2023 Toyota Highlander will be subject to a $500 theft surcharge effective immediately as it’s on the Top 10 most stolen vehicle list.

Crazy part is that if I buy a “Club” and take a pic of it installed on the car and send it to CAA they will not charge me the surcharge.
 
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Here are some points in no particular order. Just me thinking out loud reading this 5-page thread. Do what you want with these comments. I am not providing legal advice to anyone. I also apologize in advance if this is full of grammatical mistakes. It’s been a long day and I’m not going back to proof read this before posting:
  • Your best bet is to shop around for quotes from multiple different insurers every few years. John Doe user giving his anecdotal story of getting a good rate from insurer A doesn’t mean much. Insurer A may be good for him but bad for someone else. Insurance rates differ drastically based upon individual and regional factors. A married retired male living in rural Alberta with no claims history is going to be treated differently than a 30 year old from Brampton. Even a 30 year old male living in Toronto will be treated differently than a 30 year old male in Brampton.
  • Insurance rates also differ drastically based upon coverage limits even if all other factors are the same. Most people have $1M liability coverage and standard accident benefits on their auto policies. I have $4M liability coverage and heightened SABs. Would I be surprised if my rates are higher than my identical twin next door neighbour who has less coverage? No.
  • Also realize that some insurers underwrite policies directly. They don’t underwrite through brokers. So your best bet is to reach out to one or two insurance brokers and then also email the few insurers who underwrite policies directly.
  • I am not aware of plan to increase insurance rates across the board in February. Perhaps that might have been a scare tactic by a sales agent to get you to lock in with that insurer asap.
  • However, you generally shouldn’t be surprised if insurance rates increase year over year. They usually do for everyone. Things get more expensive with time. It’s called inflation. But sometimes if you have been a very good boy or girl you get a discount from your insurer. It’s never easy to predict which way it will go.
  • Purchase as much insurance as you can reasonably afford, especially heightened SABs. From this thread, I gather that people focus too much on the cost of property damage coverage. I care more about what money the insurer will pay if I lose a leg or run down a pedestrian and have all my assets at stake.
  • Increasing from $1M to $2M in liability coverage also usually costs only a few extra dollars. Do it. Get more if you can as I assume anyone with a C8 Corvette has a good assets at stake.
  • Not sure what TD bank has anything to do with TD insurance. Also not sure if an insurer paying out a lot in Alberta for forest fires or floods one year has much impact on auto rates in Ontario. Insurers have different underwriting departments if different regions. They also have different claims departments in different regions. TD insurance might be understaffed and not responsive to claims in one region but on the other side of the country maybe they have decent customer service.
  • You should try to bundle home and auto together to save.
  • Shop around every few years. Cooperators was best for me a few years ago but now it might not be competitive any more and I’ll probably shop around to see what quotes I get.
  • The one comment by the body shop manager saying CAA can be bad to deal with and a few other insurers being better… that might all be true. But that is also an anecdotal story by one body shop in Ontario. It also doesn’t mean that’s how you would be treated by the same insurers in other regions. How the PD claims department treats an auto body shop also doesn’t mean that is how the accident benefits or liability claims departments of the same insurer will treat you. These companies are huge. Their departments have different people with deferent operating polices. Aviva might be easy to deal with on PD claims but is notoriously hard to deal with on personal injury claims.
  • The comment that “Statistically, 87.2% of statistics are made up on the spot”… very accurate.
  • 1st Vette, the fact that you referred to Caveat Emptor has me intrigued. Do you have any legal training? Most lay people don’t throw around Latin legal principles like that.
 
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redpearl99 said:
Here are some points in no particular order. Just me thinking out loud reading this 5-page thread. Do what you want with these comments. I am not providing legal advice to anyone. I also apologize in advance if this is full of grammatical mistakes. It’s been a long day and I’m not going back to proof read this before posting:
  • Your best bet is to shop around for quotes from multiple different insurers every few years. John Doe user giving his anecdotal story of getting a good rate from insurer A doesn’t mean much. Insurer A may be good for him but bad for someone else. Insurance rates differ drastically based upon individual and regional factors. A married retired male living in rural Alberta with no claims history is going to be treated differently than a 30 year old from Brampton. Even a 30 year old male living in Toronto will be treated differently than a 30 year old male in Brampton.
  • Insurance rates also differ drastically based upon coverage limits even if all other factors are the same. Most people have $1M liability coverage and standard accident benefits on their auto policies. I have $4M liability coverage and heightened SABs. Would I be surprised if my rates are higher than my identical twin next door neighbour who has less coverage? No.
  • Also realize that some insurers underwrite policies directly. They don’t underwrite through brokers. So your best bet is to reach out to one or two insurance brokers and then also email the few insurers who underwrite policies directly.
  • I am not aware of plan to increase insurance rates across the board in February. Perhaps that might have been a scare tactic by a sales agent to get you to lock in with that insurer asap.
  • However, you generally shouldn’t be surprised if insurance rates increase year over year. They usually do for everyone. Things get more expensive with time. It’s called inflation. But sometimes if you have been a very good boy or girl you get a discount from your insurer. It’s never easy to predict which way it will go.
  • Purchase as much insurance as you can reasonably afford, especially heightened SABs. From this thread, I gather that people focus too much on the cost of property damage coverage. I care more about what money the insurer will pay if I lose a leg or run down a pedestrian and have all my assets at stake.
  • Increasing from $1M to $2M in liability coverage also usually costs only a few extra dollars. Do it. Get more if you can as I assume anyone with a C8 Corvette has a good assets at stake.
  • Not sure what TD bank has anything to do with TD insurance. Also not sure if an insurer paying out a lot in Alberta for forest fires or floods one year has much impact on auto rates in Ontario. Insurers have different underwriting departments if different regions. They also have different claims departments in different regions. TD insurance might be understaffed and not responsive to claims in one region but on the other side of the country maybe they have decent customer service.
  • You should try to bundle home and auto together to save.
  • Shop around every few years. Cooperators was best for me a few years ago but now it might not be competitive any more and I’ll probably shop around to see what quotes I get.
  • The one comment by the body shop manager saying CAA can be bad to deal with and a few other insurers being better… that might all be true. But that is also an anecdotal story by one body shop in Ontario. It also doesn’t mean that’s how you would be treated by the same insurers in other regions. How the PD claims department treats an auto body shop also doesn’t mean that is how the accident benefits or liability claims departments of the same insurer will treat you. These companies are huge. Their departments have different people with deferent operating polices. Aviva might be easy to deal with on PD claims but is notoriously hard to deal with on personal injury claims.
  • The comment that “Statistically, 87.2% of statistics are made up on the spot”… very accurate.
  • 1st Vette, the fact that you referred to Caveat Emptor has me intrigued. Do you have any legal training? Most lay people don’t throw around Latin legal principles like that.
Click to expand...
So beware of those that do ? lol . Thank you for the clarification of the points we have all speculated on from a layman’s perspective. You are obviously liberaliter educatus where as we for the most part are simply
mediocris “ Joe‘s . Hopefully you will be willing to provide tutelage to the members regarding this quite baffling subject. Thanks again for your time and insight.
 
redpearl99 said:
I hope you don't mind but I'm changing my name to liberaliter educatus. Happy to help where I can.
Click to expand...
I am sure that would be most appreciated. One of the nice things about this fine form is that for the most part members will go out of their way to be both as helpful and respectful as they can. Quite refreshing in this day and age.
 
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I called my insurance guy yesterday to let him know that I will be buying a new SUV to replace 1 of our older ones. He told me that at some point in February he will get a list of cars/people that will be advised to add a tracking device (or a good alarm system). The clients will have a few months to comply or will be subject to a insurance increase. I don't have all the details of this said increase but I was also told that if you comply you would also get a little discount.
 
1st Vette said:
Just wondering if anyone else has heard about pending rate increases for vehicle insurance. I just got a tentative quote from TD , as I have yet to get my car, and was told that they are anticipating an approximately 20 to 30 % increase across the board , industry wide, as early as February. The agent said it was the highest one time increase they have ever seen. May be a good idea for anyone with a VIN that has yet to receive their car to insure it now. Do the math of course but worth a thought. :cry:
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I pay around $1400.00 for 8 mths. Clean driving record. ICBC state run agency.
 
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