Rental Car Insurance Coverage
Hello, I have two vehicles insured with Allstate Insurance. However, they are older vehicles and I keep liability only on each vehicle, a car and a truck. If something were to happen to either vehicle(hit a tree), it would be my nickel to replace or not. I called Allstate today to see if they would cover my upcoming vacation rental car fully if possible damages may incur? They said the rental car would be fully and wholly insured through my liability only coverage and I do not need to purchase any additional collision/comprehensive insurance through the rental car company. What?? Can someone explain why this would be? Are they correct? I would understand completely if I carried full comprehensive/collision on my own vehicles, yes, this coverage would carry over to any and all rental cars I may drive. But this is not the case for me. My personal vehicle have liability coverage only. How can I make sure they are telling me the correct information here? You are liable to the rental car company. The cars you are renting are not your own, they are other people's property. Damage to other people's property is liability. Just like if you borrowed someone else's car. Just be sure the property damage limits of your policy is enough to cover any damages. If that is the way your agent described it, you can count on it being the case. For other people reading this...not all companies do it this way. It is best to discuss this with your agent before proceeding. Thank you Whitenack. I think I understand. Even though I am driving, this rental car is another person's property and would be covered under my liability coverage. Does this mean, if the rental car were destroyed, they would 'make whole' to the rental car company? How much would I be responsible for? At least? the deductible under my liability coverage which shows $250.00? Sorry but just trying to figure out the worst scenario with the best outcome. I can put full comprehensive/collision on one of my vehicles here at home for 30 days(minimum time) for about $27.00 with a $500.00 deductible per my agent if I decide. She insists that I do not need this to cover the rental car, however. Under my liability only policy: My property damage shows $50,000 per occurrence. Uninsured Motorists property damage $25,000 per occurrence. Usually there is no deductible on liability. You would not be responsible for anything, other than having a claim on your record which in time could raise your premiums. Your limits are on the low side. Yes, $50k would probably take care of most vehicles out there, but what if you hit another car? If you are driving around a nice $30k rental car and hit a nice $30k SUV, you are in trouble. Another thing to consider...the rental car company's insurance policy is not terribly expensive. With that, you know without a doubt you are fully covered, and you know that if you have an accident, it won't affect your insurance premiums. Don't forget many credit card companies will also cover the insurance if you pay for the rental with their card. At least I know some used to. Haven't rented a car in 10 yrs. Another thing....these are fleet vehicles....unless you go way upscale...I doubt any of them would be 30K cars. Of course..theres a lot of other cars out on the road that are way over that. I would suggest increasing your liability limits substantially for two reasons: 1 They are low compared to the cost you could incur for a claim which would potentially result in significant out of pocket expense to you. 2 Your under and uninsured motorist coverage limits cannot be higher than your liability limits. Simplest to use an example here - I had a patient who got hit and suffered permanent injuries which resulted in, among other things, her having to change jobs. The driver who hit her had minimal coverage which was quickly exhausted. She filed the remainder of the claim against her own company on the underinsured motorist section. Her arbitration settlement was for $280,000 but she was only carrying a $100,000 limit on her liability policy so she literally missed out on $150,000 she could have had were her limits higher. That said, to your original question; yes, your liability coverage would cover everything involved with a rental car claim (as mentioned, not all do this so one should check but you did so). Thank you everyone for the good information! Thank you all for taking the time here. I understand that my uninsured limits may be to low and I should increase them. I heard recently that many, many people have dropped their vehicle insurance altogether. Many aren't working and just can not afford to pay any amount of their car insurance premiums. Whether I drive my own or a rental, the odds are high that the other party involved may not have any coverage or very little. .....And as well, new garden-variety cars of any kind are running $60,000+ these days. It might be a good idea to up the amounts. I did call Visa and my card(s) would fully insure a rental car per the Visa agent. She did say that they, Visa is supplemental to my main vehicle insurance. My main vehicle insurance would fall in place first as primary and then Visa become second insured and would pick up any addition charges thereafter. Visa would be responsible for the rental car alone and does not include any medical whatsoever for myself or the other driver. She also said I can not purchase the rental's comprehensive coverage in any way or the Visa benefit would be null and void. I recently changed(7/2011) from an 'old line' policy with Allstate to a newer line. My rates were getting higher than I thought they should be at about $1,200 per year. Within this 'old line' policy I was paying for the privilege they could never cancel me(agent said first I'd heard about non-cancel...never thought to ask?) and that kept the rates high. With the 'new line' policy, my rates were cut in half at (less than) $600.00 per year but they could cancel my policy at anytime. I have never had a claim of any kind with my car insurance and thought the new line policy would serve me better. haha! It may be better to purchase insurance direct from the rental car company and as said early, my private insurance would not be involved in anyway. Still pondering.... What would Scooby do? I will get with a local rental company and get particulars of exactly what they charge for insurance, what's involved, how much and what the insurance might cover such as medical for all concerned, etc, etc. Curious about what you all would do under same circumstance? At a later time, I would like to ask about what each line of my auto policy means? I will take a pic and black-out all personal info and add it to a post. Curious about some of the language and what it means. My agent tries to explain it out but not like you folks do here. In this day and age, you never know who is being fully truthful. Reading around on this forum, if info is off, they get the 'Do It Yourself' (((smackdown)))!! Boom! Bam! .....so it is somewhat trustful here.
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