Best Car Insurance Company - How Is A Person To Choose?

Car Insurance Company

How is the average insurance buyer ever going to determine which car insurance company is the best? That sounds like a nightmare instead of a shopping comparison. Insurance agencies are located in every major city and suburb in America. These agencies are either independent agents that represent several insurance companies or exclusive agents that represent one company. These are insurance companies that use the agent distribution as their method of marketing their products.

Some insurance companies have chosen to eliminate the agent and use the mail, the telephone, or the internet to sell their products. The property and casualty companies are always in a battle for market penetration. The insurance companies have to walk a fine line between new acquisitions and expense to do business.

This is important information for the consumer because they are the ones making the final decision on who is winning. The best insurance company for you may be completely different than one preferred by your next door neighbor. Time and experience have a way of guiding you to your choice of companies.

Things to Consider….

1. Insurance Agent – The car insurance agent has been the single most successful means of insurance distribution in insurance history. The neighborhood agent has ties to the community and is easily accessible. That is a great value to a great many people especially with people who want person to person advice and counsel.


2. Direct Distribution – This is the name that we will give to the insurance companies that sell you insurance with 800 telephone numbers or through the internet and mailing services. They sell direct to you and you are serviced by them through customer service call centers. The direct distributor claims to have lower rates because they have eliminated the agent.

Once you determine how you want to be serviced then you can begin a search for those types of insurance companies. AM Best is a rating guide that you can find in your local library that gives you the financial strength of each insurance company.

Auto Insurance – Which Type Is Right For You?

Auto insurance is a form of insurance available to consumers who own cars, trucks and other vehicles. It covers the insured party against the risks involved in owning or driving a vehicle. This may be a car accident, damage caused to other cars or property, loss to passengers in your car, and damage to your car itself.

Auto Insurance Optional Covers

There are different levels of insurance available depending on what risks you wants to cover. You can cover against the costs of repairing your vehicle after an accident. You can cover the cost of purchasing a new car should yours be stolen or damaged beyond repair. These are optional covers.

Liability insurance on the other hand is compulsory for all drivers. This will cover the risk of claims being made against you as the driver or owner of the vehicle that caused damage to the property of another, the vehicle of another, for medical expenses of others injured as a result of an accident, including passengers in your car. If you have liability insurance, it will only cover these risks. If you have comprehensive insurance it will cover also the risks to yourself and your own vehicle.

auto insurance

GAP Insurance 

However, even comprehensive insurance will not fully cover your risks. First of all there is the issue that, as soon as you buy a new car, its price suddenly drops significantly because it is no longer new. It is used. So if you were to destroy your car the day after buying it, the insurance company would likely assess the value as something less than what you paid for it, even though you may still owe a good deal more than that in payments and financing.


To cover the chances of this happening, so called GAP insurance was developed. This covers the difference in the actual value of your car, and the amount you still owe in payments. The growth of vehicle leasing has also led to GAP insurance becoming more important.


Extra Cover

In the US, the insurance policy will generally cover the owner of the vehicle and any others who drive the vehicle so long as they do not live at the same address. For those living at the same address, you should have them specifically added to your insurance policy for an extra fee. This means that if you crash someone else’s car, while driving it with their permission, you will be covered by their policy, not your own. Non-owner policies are available to cover you on other people’s cars but these will only be available if you do not own your own car.