Insurance Policy Pro

Here’s a great article on Auto Insurance money saving tips that I came across over at MillionDollarJourney.com. Take a look:

Increase Your Deductible

The deductible is the amount of the claim that you are willing to pay. If your claim is $2000 and your deductible is $500, you will pay $500 and your insurance company will pay $1500. Increasing the deductible from $500 -> $1000 can reduce your premium by 5%-10%.

Insure your Home and Automobile with the Same Company

Buying your home and auto insurance policies with the same company will give you a discount on BOTH policies. Sometimes up to 10%.

Insure all Vehicles under the Same Policy

If you have multiple vehicles, placing them under the same policy can save you up to 10%.

Buy a Car that Costs Less to Insure

Be sure to get insurance quotes on the vehicle that you are planning on purchasing. You can get comparative quotes online at: http://www.Kanetix.ca

Shop the Insurance Market

Coverage may be pretty standard in your province, but premium differences can be vast. Make sure to shop around by getting quotes from multiple companies.

Follow the Speed Limit
Not only can speeding tickets be costly, they can jack up your auto insurance premiums also! (Perhaps I speak from experience?)

Source: Million Dollar Journey

Too many small-business owners don’t really understand the nuts and bolts of their business insurance policies. And when disaster strikes and it comes time to make a claim, plenty of policyholders are shocked to find that they weren’t as protected as they thought. Here are seven reasons your claim will be denied:

Punishing Terms

If you are sued, your insurance company may cover damages resulting from bodily injury, property damage or even libel and defamation infringement up to the limits of your policy. Punitive damages, however, are not usually covered.

Protocol Pitfalls

If you fail to do certain things required by your insurance policy, your insurer may have the right to deny your claim. Other protocol pitfalls include failing to pay all premiums on time, spending money on lawyers without the insurance company’s consent, and not notifying your insurer of your claim within a specified period of time. All can lead to trouble when filing a claim.

Exasperating Exclusions

Business interruption insurance does not include coverage for such risks as emergency evacuations by civil authorities and major utility disruptions–unless they were specifically added to a policy. Watch for these and other exclusions.

Paper Chase

Critical documents–such as property titles, deeds and other original documents–are not typically covered by a standard property insurance policy, though you can buy separate insurance that will cover the cost to replace documents stolen or damaged by a fire or flood.

Bad Behavior

Insurance companies tend to throw up their hands if they believe something illegal has occurred. For instance, if one of your employees had an accident while driving drunk in a company car, consider that claim denied.

Application Errors

One common mistake is providing the wrong information in the insurance application. For example, if you told your insurer your building had an operational sprinkler system when you applied for the insurance, but it didn’t, that fire claim almost certainly will be denied. Indeed, even accidental misrepresentations can make your policy null and void.

Sudden Switches

“This year’s lawsuits may cause insurance carriers to exclude a certain risk next year,” says David E. Wood, co-founder of Wood & Bender, a law firm specializing in insurance policy enforcement. “They will inform you what they plan to exclude in the coming year, but the letter of notification may go unnoticed if you aren’t paying attention.” Best bet: Stay ahead of the underwriting curve for your particular industry.

Source: (Forbes.com)

Massachusetts is “experimenting” with mandatory health insurance, according to the Dr. Judy Ann Bigby, the commonwealth’s secretary of Health and Human Services. Under a new law that went into effect July 1, Massachusetts citizens are required to obtain health insurance or face a penalty. NPR has an interview with Dr. Bigby where she explains the experimental nature of the project and its stated goals.Especially amusing is the part where she’s asked to explain the fact that the fines employers face for not offering health care to their workers are so low as to be pointless, while the fines employees face for not obtaining health care policies are..well, harder to ignore.

Source: Massachusetts Makes Health Insurance Mandatory [NPR]

The issue of life insurance is a recurring one. More and more people are starting to realize they need life insurance and for good reason. Here are some life insurance basics to help get you started:

1.) Term Insurance
“Term” implies that the life insurance will be for a specified period of time. The term is usually up before you die. This insurance is best for temporary needs or for those with very limited budgets. The most important thing is to have enough of the insurance. However, if you want to have insurance available for when you do pass away, term insurance probably won’t meet your needs. In that instance, only permanent insurance will provide what you’re looking for.

2.) Permanent Insurance
This type of insurance does cost more than term insurance and should only be purchased when your needs are met and your budget allows for a higher premium payment. The premiums for this type of insurance however will never increase whereas the rates for term insurance can be raised from time to time thus making it unaffordable in old age. Often the premiums can even be paid from earnings within the policy as you get older. This is a good option when you retire as your income will drop and you won’t be faced with paying premiums which makes it a good investment for retirement planning as well.

3.) On the same note, if you ever face financial crisis, the cash surrender value of a permanent policy can be used to pay the premiums and maybe provide some cash while you’re still in financial trouble.

4.) Permanent life insurance will also build savings over time. The earnings on those savings are tax-free while they are building up and maybe even forever. These values are given back to you if you take out a loan on the policy or when you cancel your policy. And you don’t have to pay it back. The amount of the loan plus any interest will just be subtracted from the amount of insurance paid out in the event of your death.

5.) It’s important to add the waiver for premium provision. This ensures that in case of disability, your will not have to pay the premiums and the insurance company will pay the premiums for you.

6.) The idea that’s becoming so popular of “buying term and investing the difference” is only good on the surface. However the reality is that most of us are not very good savers or investors. The negative U.S. savings rate will further prove this. Often as well, what we do save is often spent before it builds up much value. Even if we invest the difference, problems arise when we are too conservative and lose money because of inflation and lost growth opportunities or we are too aggressive and lose money because are not as experienced in the field.

Life insurance, no matter what type is best for you at any particular time, is an extremely important investment to make. You can always change your options so do what’s best for you at the time and then you can re-evaluate the situation further down the road as needed.

There was a great deal of press coverage after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 regarding lawsuits against insurance companies for damage not covered. Approximately two-thirds of homeowners and three-quarters of businesses were not covered for losses covered by flooding. This is a staggering amount.

Why weren’t they covered? Well, since 1968 flood damage has not been included in standard coverage policies. This disaster showed how important it is to have an all-peril policy.

Most homeowners mistakenly believe that their policy covers them for a wide variety of disasters and damage. One-third of participants in an NAIC survey believed that they were covered in event of a flood when they were not.

This lack of knowledge is alarming seeing as how in the U.S. every year, the average estimated costs for damage from flooding is more than $2.4 billion. This is according to the National Flood Insurance Program.

Consumers and insurers can both be blamed for this problem. The homeowner does not read their insurance policy because it is a very long document with heavy wording that is often not easily understood. The insurance companies are very reluctant to change this however as they have proven to be written in such a way that protects them from litigation.

But this does not mean that homeowners are completely helpless should they be victims of flooding. Flood coverage is provided by National Flood Insurance Program and can be purchased separately from homeowner’s insurance. Consumers must also purchase separate coverage for earthquakes and damage from mould.

Everybody is at flood risk in the U.S. It only depends on the level risk for the area in which you live. As a result, it’s very important that homeowner’s take the time to ask questions of their insurance company to ensure that they are getting the coverage they need on their homeowner’s insurance policy.

I came across this great article over at TheStreet.com about 8 steps to take before purchasing a homeowner’s insurance policy. Take a look, and keep these things in mind when purchasing your first homeowner’s insurance policy.

1. Collect all personal information needed to get a quote.
This includes your address and social security number. It also includes safety specifics, such as the nearest hydrant, fire station, central alarm information, etc.

2. Consult with friends, neighbors and family members.
Find out who they use for their homeowners insurance and if they are satisfied with their coverage. People are very quick to share horror stories and/or successes regarding their insurance company. This can save you valuable time in your search.

3. Decide if you want to use an agent, direct writer or the Internet.
This is an important determinant in the amount of time you will spend shopping for your policy. Many people already have an excellent relationship with an agent and may decide to go that route. Keep in mind that the extra work done by an agent may come with a somewhat higher price.

4. Know the limits of coverage, and deductibles.
You can always request quotes for multiple options. But it’s good to have an idea of what you want beforehand.

5. Set aside time to contact agents, companies or web sites.
A good plan of action will help cut down on the amount of time involved.

6. Take good notes.
You will need to know who to contact in order to select a particular policy. You may want to create a small worksheet to track your different quotes and coverage. This can help you ensure you are making “apples-to-apples” comparisons among your choices of policy.

7. Narrow your list down. Delve deeper into the remaining choices.
Each company’s financial strength rating as assigned by the major credit rating agencies, Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s, A.M. Best and TheStreet.com Ratings.

Contact your state’s department of insurance to see if they can provide you with any information on the companies’ history of consumer complaints or anything else that may help you in your decision-making process. For help in contacting your state insurance department, try this link.

Conduct a quick search on the Internet to glean any other valuable information pertaining to the companies in question.

Ask each company on your list if they offer “package” or discounted rate if you also insure your automobiles with the same company.

8. Select a company. Submit a purchase application.
If the paperwork comes back with a premium quote that differs significantly from what you were initially quoted, don’t hesitate to move on to your second choice of company.

Source: (TheStreet.com)