What is the most important part of your Arizona Auto Insurance policy?
When you buy a vehicle you are required by the State of Arizona to carry mandatory minimum liability insurance on your Arizona Car Insurance policy.
What does that mean?
They are referring to your “Bodily Injury” and “Property Damage” coverage on your policy. These are called “liability” protection because they provide protection to the other party if you are at-fault in an accident. In other words, if you cause injuries to the other person and damage their vehicle.
Liability coverage DOES NOT provide any coverage for you or your vehicle.
Bodily Injury – provides coverage for injuries to the other party resulting from an accident that you are found to be at-fault.
Property Damage – pays to fix someone else’s property if you are at-fault. Usually this pays to fix the other person’s vehicle that you have damaged, but could include any other property that is damaged.
What we focus on
When we buy Arizona Car Insurance, we usually focus on the premium, the deductible, and whether the policy covers glass replacement, towing or car rental.
These are important, but they are not the most important part of your policy.
The most vital part of your policy is the Bodily Injury and Property Damage.
We already mentioned that these items protect the “other” person. But what happens if you have too little coverage. Well, that’s where you could get into trouble.
The Example
Let’s say your Arizona Auto Insurance policy has $25,000 Bodily Injury limits and you are At-Fault in a car accident. Let’s pretend the other driver is a career professional earning a very good income. If this person is injured and unable to work, you can potentially be held responsible and liable for their Injuries as well as their Lost Income.
How far would $25,000 go in the above example? Probably not very far. Keep in mind that you are liable for their injuries and any income that they lose due to the accident. It potentially means you could be personally sued and possibly held responsible for any damages above your policy limits.
An attorney waiting in the wings
The last thing you need is someone to hire an attorney to file a lawsuit against you simply because you carried too little liability insurance.
We occasionally insure clients who carry less than what we believe is adequate coverage. This does not mean we turn clients away if they carry less than what we recommend. It simply means that we offer our advice and allow the client to decide for themselves what level of coverage they want. Our job is to offer advice and consultation.
Sometimes we all feel insurance poor from time to time. Trust me, we all feel that way once in awhile. But there are certain things we can cut corners on and certain things we should not cut corners on. Bodily Injury happens to be one of those items we should pay to have high limits on.
Uninsured Motorist
Uninsured Motorist coverage protects you and passengers from resulting injuries if someone hits you, they are at-fault and have no insurance (uninsured).
I have read that in Arizona about 1 in 5 drivers has no auto insurance. If someone else is at-fault, you expect them to cover your injuries, right? What if they do not have any insurance? You are on your own, for the most part. That is where Uninsured Motorist coverage will help.
There is also Underinsured Motorist that you may need to ask more questions about.
Medical
Medical coverage on your Arizona Auto Insurance policy covers injuries to you or passengers in your vehicle. We have one client who used to be a girl scout leader. She carried little girls around and having medical coverage made great sense for her. So think about who else might ride in your vehicle besides you and prepare accordingly. Keep in mind that ultimately, you are responsible for those who ride along with you.
You may be surprised
While we write insurance for lots of different companies, you may be surprised to know that quite often it costs very little to increase your Bodily Injury coverage from $50,000 to $100,000 or $100,000 to $250,000. Ask us to quote higher coverage versus what you carry now. See if the increase in premium makes sense to carry the higher limits.
The higher limits help protect you financially, as well. If you are at-fault in an accident the higher limits may help you from being held personally responsible for the resulting medical bills the other party incurs as well as the income they lose.
Own a home? Have money in the bank? A savings account? Other assets? Earn a decent income?
Protect those assets and your income with higher limits on Bodily Injury.