New Car Owners Lack Insurance Knowledge
NU Online News Service, Jan. 14, 8:50 a.m. EST?A survey has found that although new car owners are very well-informed about various features of their vehicles, they are much less knowledgeable about one critical aspect of maintaining automobiles: insurance coverage.[@@]
The survey, by the Progressive group of insurance companies, found that nearly all drivers who recently bought new cars were familiar with many details of the vehicle. For example, 98 percent of those surveyed said they know their new car's transmission type, and 91 percent knew how many cylinders their car had. And at 99 percent, nearly all of the respondents surveyed said they knew how many airbags their new car had and where they were located.
On the other hand, 51 percent of those surveyed said they didn't know the amount of bodily injury liability coverage they had for one person, while 62 percent didn't know their liability coverage limits per accident. The survey, conducted from Dec. 16 to 30 last year, consists of responses from 500 new car owners.
According to the survey, 87 percent of drivers surveyed said the cost of auto insurance was not a factor in deciding whether to buy a new car or which model to purchase. Furthermore, some 30 percent of those surveyed didn't even know how much they paid every six months to insure their newly purchased vehicle.
Tom Hollyer, product development manager at Mayfield Village, Ohio-based Progressive commented that while buyers put lots of thought into what features they want in their new vehicle, "our survey showed that many new car buyers don't pay as much attention to their car insurance."
Mr. Hollyer advised that new car buyers should clearly understand how the make and model they choose affect their insurance premium. "That's because rates are determined not only by driver characteristics such as age and gender," he explained, "but also by vehicle characteristics, which generally include the car's make, model and year, weight, horsepower, body type, wheel base, and vehicle type."
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