American Vs Canadian insurance | GTAMotorcycle.com

American Vs Canadian insurance

bigpoppa

bigpoppa

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Been doing some research and apparently the americans (sneakily) use your credit history/score to gauge your 'risk' factor and not so much all the relevant stuff, I wonder if canadian underwriters are doing this as well...

Any Pros want to weigh in on this?
 
When I lived in BC they used to factor in your credit rating a I used to get a notification of a credit check from ICBC. I guess thy want to make sure you can keep up the payments :)
 
It's possible that there's a correlation between credit scores and claims. But it might not be what most expect.
 
In CA your credit rating makes a difference if you are paying monthly. If it's poor you may pay more or be asked to pay up front.

And - if you have any sense - most people carry more coverage. I have $4mm accident benefits compared with $3500 in Ontario and $4mm liability. It's still cheaper though :)

Unlike Ontario you consume your car insurance first before other coverage, where in Ontario you have to exhaust your company benefits and other benefits before you get a cent out of a your car insurance company
 
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That's what I hate about Ontario. You are forced to pay for Accident Benefits then forced to use your own benefits if anything happens.

If you have another misshap like a sports injury and your benefits are gone you are then SOL. The car insurance company won't pay for that
 
Baggsy said:
It's possible that there's a correlation between credit scores and claims. But it might not be what most expect.
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Yes indeed...there's a comedian who makes jokes about "I gotta wreck the truck in order to make this months payment on the truck". Comedy aside, it happens in the USA - people get in over their head, behind on payments..and the solution is for insurance to pay out on a write off and they can just walk away from it all.
 
CruisnGrrl said:
Also they don't have some of the same coverages, ie healthcare
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but they do have "diminished value" coverage...

My 6 month old F150 was hit, sustaining over $16k in damage... Sure, insurance covered the repairs but in practical terms my vehicle is now worthless.
 
The difference is like black & white (coverage, rules, rates ... everything) .... recently on a trip down south, we got talking insurance and I ask a US guy says how much are you paying for a bike. He says I pay about 240$ (hopped up new R1M). I say, if I rode the same bike, I'd be probably around the same, maybe 200$. He says, that's good ... I say, no not really. Your rate is per year, mine was per month .... he said he never felt as good about his rate as he he was right at the moment ..... LOL
 
Part of the issue is that the number of bikes here is so small compared to there.
 
Baggsy said:
Part of the issue is that the number of bikes here is so small compared to there.
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Dont see how thats relevant

mxs said:
The difference is like black & white (coverage, rules, rates ... everything) .... recently on a trip down south, we got talking insurance and I ask a US guy says how much are you paying for a bike. He says I pay about 240$ (hopped up new R1M). I say, if I rode the same bike, I'd be probably around the same, maybe 200$. He says, that's good ... I say, no not really. Your rate is per year, mine was per month .... he said he never felt as good about his rate as he he was right at the moment ..... LOL
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Yeah... 200/year for R1...
 
mxs said:
The difference is like black & white (coverage, rules, rates ... everything) .... recently on a trip down south, we got talking insurance and I ask a US guy says how much are you paying for a bike. He says I pay about 240$ (hopped up new R1M). I say, if I rode the same bike, I'd be probably around the same, maybe 200$. He says, that's good ... I say, no not really. Your rate is per year, mine was per month .... he said he never felt as good about his rate as he he was right at the moment ..... LOL
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See, the thing is, you're almost certainly comparing apples to oranges.

US insurance is very much a "you get what you pay for" thing, and although you can most certainly get insurance for dirt cheap since the statute minimum coverage amounts are often laughably low - as low as $30,000 in some states.

When people get into major accidents and get sued for FAR more than that, guess who's on the hook and end up going bankrupt, losing everything, and owning millions for the rest of their life? Surprise, that cheap insurance wasn't really that forward thinking when the **** hit the fan. The internet is littered with sob stories - here's one for example of someone with a cheap $100,000 policy who's getting sued for $1.3M.

On the flipside in Ontario most policies are for $1MIL minimum in liability - legally you can go as low as $200,000 but it may be hard to find an insurance company to write that low (most insist on $1M minimum and recommend $2M)...and even at $200,000 that's still nearly 7 times higher than that "cheap" $30,000 liability policy.

Typically our medical coverage is far better as well, including long term coverage amounts that aren't capped at laughably low figures as many cheap US policies are.

So, take that guys $200/year quote, multiple that times 7, add 30% in USD/CDN exchange, and then keep in mind our better medical coverage amounts, and you're getting closer to comparing apples to apples.

Yes, our insurance system here still has issues, I'm not making complete excuses for it, but your comparison is simply off base.

Baggsy said:
Part of the issue is that the number of bikes here is so small compared to there.
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bigpoppa said:
Dont see how thats relevant.
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You should read up on how risk pools work.
 
Where did I say, that I was comparing anything, more so, apple to apple??

I said the insurance markets/systems are very different ... one lets you be insured from as little as 10$/month, the other obviously from as little 100$ to the sky-is-a-limit. Of course one minimum liability covers things the other doesn't etc. But again, the point was not compare and say one is better than the other.

The only thing I know is that Ontarians pay way too much, we easily must be at the top of the G20 world for vehicle insurance.
 
Go on the legaladvice subreddit. Lots of horror stories about getting hit by people in shitboxes with $25k liability insurance and no assets. No thanks.

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kellen said:
Go on the legaladvice subreddit. Lots of horror stories about getting hit by people in shitboxes with $25k liability insurance and no assets. No thanks.
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That's the thing. People constantly complain (here and elsewhere) about how much cheaper American insurance is, but that cheap American insurance is barely worth the paper it's printed on compared to mandatory coverage in any Canadian province.
 
I think there should be a legal limit on how much a person can sue for in an accident.

Not a legal expert so I wouldnt know where to begin, but if we can somehow control that, we can still have decent coverage, and reasonable insurance premiums.
 
bigpoppa said:
I think there should be a legal limit on how much a person can sue for in an accident.

Not a legal expert so I wouldnt know where to begin, but if we can somehow control that, we can still have decent coverage, and reasonable insurance premiums.
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There should be a legal limit on how much Marco Muzzo/marco muzzo's insurance co can be sued for?

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