No one likes paying for auto insurance, especially when their premiums are through the roof. Insurance companies such as GEICO, Farmers Insurance and State Farm all promote huge savings with ad campaigns and consumers find it hard to ignore the flashy ads and find the best price available.
If you are insured now or are shopping for new coverage, you can use these tips to find the best rates and still get good coverage. Finding the best rates in Greenwood is not that difficult. Mississippi drivers only need to know the proper methods to compare price quotes online.
There are a lot of ways to compare auto insurance quotes, but some are less time-consuming than others. You could spend the better part of a day driving to insurance companies in Greenwood, or you can stay home and use the internet to accomplish the same thing much quicker.
Most of the larger companies participate in an industry program that enables customers to enter their policy data once, and every company can give them a price based on that information. This eliminates the need for quote requests for each company.
To find out how much you can save on auto insurance click here to open in new window.
The only downside to using this type of form is buyers cannot specifically choose which companies to get quotes from. So if you prefer to pick specific providers to receive pricing from, we have a page of the cheapest auto insurance companies in Mississippi. View list of Mississippi insurance companies.
It’s your choice how you get your quotes, but make absolute certain that you use identical coverage limits with every price quote. If you have differing limits it will be next to impossible to truly determine the lowest rate in Greenwood.
Companies that sell car insurance don’t list every available discount in a way that’s easy to find, so the following is a list of both well-publicized and the more hidden ways to save on auto insurance. If you aren’t receiving every discount you qualify for, you’re paying more than you need to.
As a disclaimer on discounts, most credits do not apply to the entire policy premium. Some only apply to individual premiums such as collision or personal injury protection. So when it seems like you could get a free auto insurance policy, you’re out of luck.
For a list of providers with the best auto insurance discounts in Greenwood, click this link.
Even more information is available at the Mississippi Insurance Department website. Mississippi consumers can read consumer alerts, read state legal mandates and laws, and read enforcement actions against agents and companies.
The following articles may also be useful.
Understanding the coverages of a auto insurance policy aids in choosing appropriate coverage at the best deductibles and correct limits. The terms used in a policy can be confusing and even agents have difficulty translating policy wording. Below you’ll find the normal coverages offered by auto insurance companies.
Comprehensive or Other Than Collision
Comprehensive insurance coverage pays to fix your vehicle from damage that is not covered by collision coverage. A deductible will apply then the remaining damage will be covered by your comprehensive coverage.
Comprehensive coverage protects against claims such as hitting a bird, a broken windshield and hail damage. The most you’ll receive from a claim is the ACV or actual cash value, so if the vehicle is not worth much it’s probably time to drop comprehensive insurance.
Medical costs insurance
Med pay and PIP coverage kick in for short-term medical expenses for things like funeral costs, pain medications, nursing services and hospital visits. They are used in conjunction with a health insurance policy or if you lack health insurance entirely. Medical payments and PIP cover both the driver and occupants in addition to if you are hit as a while walking down the street. PIP coverage is not available in all states but it provides additional coverages not offered by medical payments coverage
Collision insurance
This pays to fix your vehicle from damage from colliding with a stationary object or other vehicle. You have to pay a deductible then your collision coverage will kick in.
Collision can pay for things such as crashing into a ditch, rolling your car, sideswiping another vehicle and crashing into a building. This coverage can be expensive, so analyze the benefit of dropping coverage from lower value vehicles. It’s also possible to raise the deductible in order to get cheaper collision rates.
UM/UIM Coverage
Uninsured or Underinsured Motorist coverage gives you protection when other motorists are uninsured or don’t have enough coverage. It can pay for medical payments for you and your occupants and damage to your vehicle.
Since many Mississippi drivers only purchase the least amount of liability that is required (which is 25/50/25), it doesn’t take a major accident to exceed their coverage limits. So UM/UIM coverage is very important.
Liability coverages
This coverage will cover damage that occurs to other people or property by causing an accident. It protects YOU against other people’s claims. It does not cover damage sustained by your vehicle in an accident.
Split limit liability has three limits of coverage: per person bodily injury, per accident bodily injury, and a property damage limit. Your policy might show values of 50/100/50 that translate to $50,000 bodily injury coverage, a total of $100,000 of bodily injury coverage per accident, and $50,000 of coverage for damaged propery.
Liability coverage protects against things like funeral expenses, medical services, legal defense fees, structural damage and attorney fees. How much liability coverage do you need? That is up to you, but you should buy as much as you can afford. Mississippi state minimum liability requirements are 25,000/50,000/25,000 but drivers should carry higher limits.
In this article, we presented quite a bit of information on how to shop for auto insurance online. The most important thing to understand is the more companies you get rates for, the more likely it is that you will get a better rate. Consumers may even find the lowest priced auto insurance comes from the least-expected company. They can often insure niche markets at a lower cost than the large multi-state companies such as GEICO and State Farm.
Lower-priced auto insurance can be found from both online companies and with local Greenwood insurance agents, and you need to comparison shop both in order to have the best chance of saving money. Some companies do not offer you the ability to get quotes online and most of the time these smaller companies sell through independent agents.
When buying insurance coverage, don’t be tempted to reduce coverage to reduce premium. There have been many situations where consumers will sacrifice physical damage coverage only to regret that it was a big mistake. Your focus should be to buy a smart amount of coverage for the lowest price while not skimping on critical coverages.