Auto Insurance Refund Check

I had heard that this might happen...

Much to my surprise a check arrived in the mail today.   The letter stated one-time $50 payment for each vehicle insured.  For me that means a $500 check!

This includes payment on 3 vehicles that are off the road and generally just have storage insurance that costs me $3-ish each per month so more than a free years worth of insurance on those.  Net result, the payment covers more than 2 months worth of insurance expense.  

Wow. Who's your insurer?

My State Farm agent had her office call around and they caught me one day.  
 

How are you doing? Family okay with C-19?
 

Yes, I'm excited to get that rebate check I heard about on the news. 
 

15% credit on my June bill for 2 months.  

If I did the math correctly we should be getting an $80 refund, which I won't complain about, but is pretty small compared to the ~$2600 in annual premiums we pay. 

Cactus said:

Wow. Who's your insurer?

America Family Ins. 

Flo is giving out 20% for 2 months. So not huge but better than nothing. 

I'm a moderator on another car forum, and there's a thread there where people have listed companies that are providing discounts of varying degrees.  Names so far include West Bend Mutual,  Allstate, American Family, USAA, Liberty Mutual, Auto Owners, Geico, Progressive, Travelers, Nationwide, Farm Bureau of Michigan, Erie Insurance, Utica.  

No collector car insurance companies have been named, but their premiums are typically so low already (and the cars insured with them aren't essential for travel) I'd be surprised if any them will offer discounts.

USAA is refunding 2 months or something like that. I haven't checked to see if I've gotten it (wife deals with the bills), but I'm sure it'll show up. They send me a dividend refund every year already. 

I've got a fleet of eight trucks. My insurer just sent me a refund check for about 25 bucks. Their generosity knows no bounds.

I have Erie insurance and per a email I got recently I should be getting a refund check for a little over half of what my monthly payment is. Can't really complain as I'm still driving to work everyday and such. 

Without this thread I wouldn't have known to check with my insurance company, Grange.

Come to find out, 25% for 2 months, is my refund check come May.

Winning!

Is this kindness, or some proactive move to do something before some regulator notices that their risks have drastically dropped against the assumptions that justified the premiums they've collected?

It's good PR and costs them very little overall. Being on the claims side I've seen claims plummet since this all started. All of them have been saving a crap ton of money by people staying home.

This past week has seen an uptick but still nowhere near normal.

I can't find anything online from NCFB. Enough refund for a free month would be cool.

Met Life is giving me a credit of 15% for 2 months for autos.  Seems pretty standard these days.

My 250 dollar check from AmFam showed up last week.   A wonderful surprise.

It's a regulated industry, correct?  So, they are legally bound to make reasonable returns on their investment.  If their costs go down (less claims, etc), I don't think they can just keep the extra money.  They have to negotiate/litigate with their regulatory body on what is fair.  I'm sure there are consumer advocacy groups who watch this stuff who will be making noise to the regulators.  Possibly just a way to keep the regulators from having political pressure to clamp down on them.

ddavidv said:

It's good PR and costs them very little overall. Being on the claims side I've seen claims plummet since this all started. All of them have been saving a crap ton of money by people staying home.

This past week has seen an uptick but still nowhere near normal.

A guy from my IAA insurance auction tells that pre-Corona they took in 100-150 cars per day. Now it is down to 25 per day. 

Mike (Forum Supporter) said:

Is this kindness, or some proactive move to do something before some regulator notices that their risks have drastically dropped against the assumptions that justified the premiums they've collected?

I'm sure this is the case. Also, competitive pressure. Imagine the commercials if some insurers decided NOT to give their customers a benefit when they were rolling in the dough due to a pandemic.

I have Nationwide and have three cars insured with them. Two with full coverage, one with minimal.  My 6 month payment is more than I really care to admit.  

My "refund" was $50. 

So I bought some pizza last night.

Safeco REALLY cares. 15% of the last 2 months payments... or about $35. I'm going out on the town tonight!

SWMBO and myself have Erie and I think were getting some amount back but its not coming until our policy is up for renewal I believe.

NJ manufacturers is also refunding 15%. Kind of a joke really, I have not even gone through half a tank of fuel in five weeks

In semirelated news I got an email yesterday saying that my claim on the 96 Miata had been settled.  I'm like wtf claim are you talking about.  Called them and they said that they are redoing totaled claims in FL and they were sending me another $144 from my claim in 2015.  I bought it back for $360 after fighting them and getting $1000 more than I paid for the car.  Got it inspected and it's still on the road with no repairs.  Bonus!

I'll be happy when im paying liability insurance for drivers and not cars.