After a recent report alleged that Wells Fargo had charged its auto loan customers for unnecessary and unwanted insurance — resulting in 25,000 repossessed vehicles — the bank now faces a lawsuit from one of those borrowers. [More]
car insurance
Wells Fargo Customers Sue Bank Over Alleged Insurance Scheme That Led To Vehicle Repossessions
By 7.31.17
Tesla Wants To Bundle Car Sales With Insurance And Maintenance
By 2.23.17
Usually when you purchase a new vehicle, you know you’ll have to buy insurance separately, and — depending on the terms of the sale — pay for maintenance costs somewhere down the proverbial and literal road. Tesla says it’s planning to eventually bundle all of that together for one price. [More]
State Farm Already Figuring Out How To Insure Autonomous Cars
By 7.27.16
If error by fallible human drivers causes 90% of car crashes, what will happen in the future when most or all of the cars on the road are autonomous? Insurance companies are already working on the answer to that question, and one of them, State Farm, had a few years’ head start. [More]
State Farm Patents Wearable Device System That Could Poke Drowsy Or Distracted Drivers
By 4.1.16
Unfortunately, we don’t all carry little elves on our person who can administer a hefty poke when we need to snap to attention. State Farm is working on a way to solve that issue with a patent for a wearable device system that can alert drivers who might be nodding off, distracted, or intoxicated behind the wheel. [More]
Google Shutters Comparison Shopping Website
By 2.23.16
Less than a year after Google jumped into the insurance business with the launch of comparison tool Google Compare, the company has decided to scrap the service. [More]
5 Ways To Improve Your Finances With Minimal Effort
By 12.30.15
Improving your finances doesn’t always require a big investment. Sometimes a single phone call or a small tweak are all you need to improve your financial future or present. Looking for some ideas as you change to your new “366 Kitten Photos” desk calendar? Here are some ideas from our financial friends down the hall at Consumer Reports to get you started. [More]
3 Things We’ve Learned About How Demographics, Credit Scores & Marital Status Affect Your Car Insurance Rates
By 11.18.15
When you get a quote for car insurance, you might think that only a few things matter — your driving record, the cost and use of your vehicle, the type of coverage you need, and other factors directly related to operating an automobile. But the fact is that many insurers are basing your insurance quotes on data points that have nothing to do with driving, like your credit score, marital status, and ZIP code. New research shows that determining price using these types of demographic and financial factors (rather than driving record alone) can have a serious impact on the affordability of car insurance. [More]
Read The Fine Print: Allstate Safe Driving Bonus Checks Aren’t Available In All States
By 11.9.15 — Updated: 6.1.17
Sometimes, it’s annoying to watch television and see ads for businesses or products that don’t exist in your area, like the Sonic ads on cable that taunted us here in the Northeast for years. In a series of Allstate ads that air nationwide, the insurer talks about a biannual bonus check that customers who don’t get in accidents receive. “Where’s my check?” asked one Allstate customer who hasn’t had an accident in decades. Where, indeed? [More]
Woman Says Walmart Tech Totaled Her Car, Company’s Effort To Make It Right Falls Short
By 8.28.15
A Texas woman who took her car to her local Walmart’s service center for a routine oil change says a technician totaled the vehicle and now the company isn’t offering her a fair settlement, leaving her stranded and her business suffering. [More]
Owners Of Wrecked Boat Out $20K Because AAA Tow Driver Used Personal Vehicle
By 3.11.15
Common sense would tell you that if your vehicle is wrecked while in the care of a AAA tow truck driver, either that driver’s insurance or AAA would be responsible for making you whole again. But if the tow driver is using their own personal truck at the time of the collision, you could be stuck holding the bill. [More]
Google Launches Car Insurance Comparison Site
By 3.5.15
Google officially jumped into the insurance business today with the launch of its car insurance comparison website in the United States. [More]
GEICO Accused Of Discriminating Against Unmarried & Low-Income Drivers
By 2.12.15
California law requirers auto insurers in the state to offer minimum-coverage policies to drivers with clean driving records, regardless of factors like gender, employment, marital status, or education. But one consumer advocacy group claims that GEICO isn’t abiding by those rules and is allegedly misleading certain customers into thinking they’re getting the minimum coverage when they are in fact being offered several times more than the minimum. [More]
Lyft Passenger Killed In Multi-Car Crash: Whose Insurance Covers What?
By 11.4.14
Normally, it wouldn’t be national news that there was a fatal multi-car crash on the highway during a heavy rainstorm near Sacramento, California. What makes this crash newsworthy is that the man who died was a paying passenger in a vehicle hired through the ride-sharing app Lyft. [More]
What’s The Most-Ticketed Car In America?
By 10.2.14
It’s definitely your own fault you were cruising past a cop at 15 mph over the limit, and we get it that great at parking between the lines, but if you happen to drive a Subaru WRX, you might just be doomed (not really). [More]
What Happens If You Find Your Stolen Car After The Insurance Company Has Paid You For It?
By 8.19.14
We’ve heard stories in the past of stolen cars turning up years after they go missing, and joyfully reunited with the owners who thought they had lost their beloved rides forever. But what happens if your insurance company has already paid you for that stolen car — is there any way to keep it if you find it again? [More]
15 Things You Need To Know About Buying Auto Insurance
By 3.19.14 — Updated: 1.11.17
This is the first in a multipart “How To Not Suck…” series on insurance. Upcoming installments will cover homeowner’s, life, long-term care, and disability insurance.
Whether you just drove off the dealer’s lot in a shiny new vehicle or you’re puttering down the highway in an old clunker, you must protect yourself, others, and your two/three/four/eighteen-wheeled investment with auto insurance. [More]
Why Picking Up Extra Money Through Ride-sharing May Not Be So Wise
By 1.27.14
Ride-sharing services like Uber and Lyft have been in the news lately, mostly because of the controversial pricing structure and clashes with the taxi industry that these companies are trying so hard to disrupt. If all of this coverage has made you think, “Hey, I want to drive strangers around for some extra cash,” that’s possible with Lyft or the lower-end UberX service. There may be a danger that you hadn’t anticipated, though. [More]
As The Auto Insurance Industry Spends Billions, Fewer Drivers Switching Insurers
By 1.30.13
All those ads trying to wheedle, cajole, convince and otherwise get drivers to switch car insurers add up to billions of dollars for insurance companies. But a new study says that even with all that financial heft, fewer drivers are deciding to take the plunge and go elsewhere. That sound you hear is money sliding down the drain. [More]
