Car insurance

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runnergirl

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Does anyone know if car insurance companies will provide intermittent coverage to individuals enrolled in the service academies, since their access to a vehicle is limited to short periods of time when they are home throughout the year? It seems expensive to provide continuous coverage for 4 years, when they will only be driving a car at home a few weeks per year for the next 4+ years.
 
We dropped him completely from our policy. When they come home for a few days they are no different than anyone else who you would let borrow your car and are covered under your policy.

If they borrow cars from upperclassmen while at USAFA (most all of them do), they should get a non-owner liability policy from USAA. They will get information on that once they get there. It is very cheap (Less than $50/yr, if I remember right) and it is good insurance for any liability when they are driving a borrowed car at USAFA.

Stealth_81
 
runnergirl said:
Does anyone know if car insurance companies will provide intermittent coverage to individuals enrolled in the service academies, since their access to a vehicle is limited to short periods of time when they are home throughout the year? It seems expensive to provide continuous coverage for 4 years, when they will only be driving a car at home a few weeks per year for the next 4+ years.
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Your state probably requires that you maintain coverage regardless of usage to maintain the tag requirements. Maybe sign your car over to your mom and dad and let them carry coverage on it at their rate, without you on the policy? Insurance companies used to sell something called trip insurance to cover just short periods for people that had driver licenses but no autos. Not sure if they still do that or not. Need to call your state motor vehicles department and see what their requirements are and then your insurance coverage to see what options they may offer. Interesting question though.
 
Laws and insurance rules vary by state.

My DS was away at college out of state with no vehicle during his freshman year, and my auto insurance company allowed me to leave him off our policy.


They advised that they still covered him when he came home for visits as a permissive driver without charging additional premium.

As stealth says above, get a non owned liability policy if he or she ever considers borrowing a car.

This sophomore year he bought a car for use at college, and so we had to add him back onto our policy.

Your situation may vary.
 
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Stealth_81 said:
We dropped him completely from our policy. When they come home for a few days they are no different than anyone else who you would let borrow your car and are covered under your policy.

If they borrow cars from upperclassmen while at USAFA (most all of them do), they should get a non-owner liability policy from USAA. They will get information on that once they get there. It is very cheap (Less than $50/yr, if I remember right) and it is good insurance for any liability when they are driving a borrowed car at USAFA.

Stealth_81
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Great information, thank you!
 
AROTC-dad said:
Laws and insurance rules vary by state.

My DS was away at college out of state with no vehicle during his freshman year, and my auto insurance company allowed me to leave him off our policy.


They advised that they still covered him when he came home for visits as a permissive driver without charging additional premium.

As stealth says above, get a non owned liability policy if he or she ever considers borrowing a car.

This sophomore year he bought a car for use at college, and so we had to add him back onto our policy.

Your situation may vary.
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Thank you!
 
BTCS/USN said:
Your state probably requires that you maintain coverage regardless of usage to maintain the tag requirements. Maybe sign your car over to your mom and dad and let them carry coverage on it at their rate, without you on the policy? Insurance companies used to sell something called trip insurance to cover just short periods for people that had driver licenses but no autos. Not sure if they still do that or not. Need to call your state motor vehicles department and see what their requirements are and then your insurance coverage to see what options they may offer. Interesting question though.
Click to expand...
Thank you!
 
We checked with our insurance company about this same question a couple weeks ago, especially if he was appointed to one of the SA's. First USAA told us we could have him changed to 'Away at college, more than 100 miles'. That didn't really bring our insurance down very much so I again stated that he would only be driving our cars a few weeks a year at most. She was a very nice but very new representative & researched a little more. Turns out with USAA, if our DS is a cadet at any of the SA's we could drop him to a 'non- operator' status on our coverage & he would still be covered, saving us hundreds each 6 months. She likened it to him being on TDY.
Call your insurance and ask them.
 
xcmum said:
We checked with our insurance company about this same question a couple weeks ago, especially if he was appointed to one of the SA's. First USAA told us we could have him changed to 'Away at college, more than 100 miles'. That didn't really bring our insurance down very much so I again stated that he would only be driving our cars a few weeks a year at most. She was a very nice but very new representative & researched a little more. Turns out with USAA, if our DS is a cadet at any of the SA's we could drop him to a 'non- operator' status on our coverage & he would still be covered, saving us hundreds each 6 months. She likened it to him being on TDY.
Call your insurance and ask them.
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Thank you, very helpful.
 
xcmum said:
We checked with our insurance company about this same question a couple weeks ago, especially if he was appointed to one of the SA's. First USAA told us we could have him changed to 'Away at college, more than 100 miles'. That didn't really bring our insurance down very much so I again stated that he would only be driving our cars a few weeks a year at most. She was a very nice but very new representative & researched a little more. Turns out with USAA, if our DS is a cadet at any of the SA's we could drop him to a 'non- operator' status on our coverage & he would still be covered, saving us hundreds each 6 months. She likened it to him being on TDY.
Call your insurance and ask them.
Click to expand...
xcmum said:
We checked with our insurance company about this same question a couple weeks ago, especially if he was appointed to one of the SA's. First USAA told us we could have him changed to 'Away at college, more than 100 miles'. That didn't really bring our insurance down very much so I again stated that he would only be driving our cars a few weeks a year at most. She was a very nice but very new representative & researched a little more. Turns out with USAA, if our DS is a cadet at any of the SA's we could drop him to a 'non- operator' status on our coverage & he would still be covered, saving us hundreds each 6 months. She likened it to him being on TDY.
Call your insurance and ask them.
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We (DS) not USAA member/affiliate yet. Is this something that is relatively easy to set up, once at USAFA? Read this is also a good way to go with banking.
 
USAA is super easy to set up here. I do my banking and property/auto insurance through them, I think the auto insurance is a great deal, especially when you hit 2* year and start driving more regularly.
 
runnergirl said:
Does anyone know if car insurance companies will provide intermittent coverage to individuals enrolled in the service academies, since their access to a vehicle is limited to short periods of time when they are home throughout the year? It seems expensive to provide continuous coverage for 4 years, when they will only be driving a car at home a few weeks per year for the next 4+ years.
Click to expand...
I have AAA insurance in California. I called them to inquire about the student away discount (100+ miles from home) and they advised me to completely drop my DS from our policy policy because he would be covered as an approved driver for up to 30 days at a time when he comes home for holidays and breaks. I saved $800 off my policy because of this move. He is only covered while driving the vehicles covered by my policy not while driving other people's cars. If they happen to need a rental car for some reason most credit cards come with rental car insurance or you can get the add on insurance from the rental car company. BTW my DS is 2020 and has been at the Academy for 8 months and has not needed a car because there is so little free time at this point. There are shuttles to and from both airports on holiday breaks and it is pretty easy to find a ride from a classmate with a car using the using the Falcon Ride app.
 
Tommyboy said:
I have AAA insurance in California. I called them to inquire about the student away discount (100+ miles from home) and they advised me to completely drop my DS from our policy policy because he would be covered as an approved driver for up to 30 days at a time when he comes home for holidays and breaks. I saved $800 off my policy because of this move. He is only covered while driving the vehicles covered by my policy not while driving other people's cars. If they happen to need a rental car for some reason most credit cards come with rental car insurance or you can get the add on insurance from the rental car company. BTW my DS is 2020 and has been at the Academy for 8 months and has not needed a car because there is so little free time at this point. There are shuttles to and from both airports on holiday breaks and it is pretty easy to find a ride from a classmate with a car using the using the Falcon Ride app.
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Thanks for the helpful info!
 
Tommyboy said:
He is only covered while driving the vehicles covered by my policy not while driving other people's cars. QUOTE]

This is not a small point. I am constantly reminding my DD that she has no coverage from me when driving someone else's car. If there was a claim, DD would be at the mercy of the car owner's coverage and no one knows how adequate that is. You could buy what is referred to as a "named non owner" policy to cover them for any excess exposure that could occur if there was a claim and the car owner's coverage was inadequate.
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BlahuKahuna said:
USAA is super easy to set up here. I do my banking and property/auto insurance through them, I think the auto insurance is a great deal, especially when you hit 2* year and start driving more regularly.
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Also good for renter's insurance. Investments is the only area that we have found them to be less competitive. For auto insurance during his C4C and C3C years, DS had his own non-owners liability policy which resulted in a nice drop in our family's USAA policy rate.
 
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