3 Guaranteed Ways to Make Your Auto Insurer Hate You

If there’s any one thing that should set your mind at ease when comparing auto insurance rates, it’s this: insurers don’t discriminate when they’re quoting you a price. They’re just stating their set cost of coverage based on data you’ve provided. But for some who always meet with incredibly high premiums when they compare auto insurance plans, it’s easy to think that the insurance company’s got it in for them.

The fact is, if the figures quoted to you every time you run an auto insurance comparison look more like a lottery payout than an affordable sum, you’ve probably got some things on your record that you’ve got to clean up. Either that, or you’re driving an incredibly expensive car that could send the insurer into bankruptcy if it gets so much as a single ding. In other words, they’re not out to get you. In fact, it’s illegal for insurers to discriminate against you based on anything other than insurance-related data. But does this mean that your insurer will always love you and will never drop you? The short answer is: no.

There are plenty of things that you can do wrong to tick your car insurance provider off and cause them to kick you to the curb. The top three are:

• Filing fraudulent claims. Yeah, insurers hate this, and for obvious reason. If you smashed up your car all on your own but you decide to try to get the insurance company to pay for it all by claiming that it got damaged by a hit-and-run driver, you’d better hope they don’t find out. You could be facing a much bigger issue than simply being kicked off of your coverage plan and forced to pay for the damages yourself. We’re talking legal issues.

•Making false statements on your application when comparing auto insurance rates. If there’s any misleading information on your initial application, be sure to come clean before you actually sign on the dotted line. For example, if you tell your insurer that you’ve got a car alarm just to take advantage of a discount and you really don’t, this could be cause to have your coverage dropped if they find out.

• Getting your license revoked or suspended. This is a big no-no because it indicates to the insurer that you’re a major insurance risk. Some insurance companies will drop your coverage even if you happen to live in the same house as someone who’s had their license revoked or suspended.

You want your auto insurance provider to like you. Getting on their bad side won’t cause them to shortchange you on an insurance payout, for example, but it could get you booted from your policy and land you right back at square one, comparing auto insurance rates and trying to find someone to take you on. The best way to avoid this is to always be honest and straightforward in your dealings with them—and to behave yourself behind the wheel.