You think your auto insurance rates are too high. Want to know why? Forget it

[rpannier]

CREDIT SCORE RULING SUPREMELY DISAPPOINTING:

Your credit score might be costing you hundreds of dollars each year on your auto insurance, but you'll never know. It's a secret. And it looks like it's going to stay that way.

Consumers took a shot to the gut this week when the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that insurers don't have to tell them when they are paying more for auto insurance because of their credit scores.

Many drivers don't even realize their credit scores are used in the complex mathematics used to calculate insurance rates. Ditto for most homeowners. But it’s true in most states; credit scores are used to raise rates for some consumers and lower them for others. There’s no way to know who is paying more and who is paying less or how much the credit score penalty is because, as I've said, it's a secret.

snip

In a not-so-thoughtful analysis, Justice David Souter offered one line of reasoning to rule in favor of insurers: Credit score penalty notices would become so commonplace that they would "go the way of junk mail." Really, he did write that. See for yourself. (Acrobat required)

link:
http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/06/supreme_court_c.html#posts

[mrcheerful]

1. Whats so secret about it? I've known about it since Reagan's reign of terror

after I found out that a person I knew who had 6 DUI convictions was paying $600 less per year on the same insurance policy as I had with the same company. I Had no accidents or tickets but had bad credit.

[SeattleGirl]

2. The Insurance Commisioner in Washington State has been fighting

this for years, because he thinks it's bullshit, and he's a REPUBLICAN, if you can believe that.

A number of years ago, I changed insurance companies. Had a speeding ticket on my record, but the insurance companies literally didn't care about that. All they wanted was my fucking credit score, which wasn't so great. And, it's worse now.

Fuck you, Corporations and Insurance/Pharmaceutial Companies.

YOU may want to judge me thusly.

YOU may want me to get on my knees and grovel to you because you think I'm such a worthless shit in your eyes.

YOU may want to sit back in your cushy leather chair, jacking off while the likes of me, the great unwashed, struggle day to day to just get by.

BUT, if there IS a God in heaven, or a Goddess, or a diety, or karma, YOU WILL GET YOURS, and I hope you suffer 100-fold.

Fucking assholes!

That is all. Please go about your day, Corporate CEO's and Fuckers of Regular People. Nothing to see here. Please ignore the bodies in the ditch. Expensive champaign and caviar ought to help you forget about us. Fuckers.

[BlueJazz]

3. And what happens to the poor souls who have been a victim ....

...of Identity theft?
I guess they get screwed again. x(

[SeattleGirl]

4. Yes, they definitely get screwed.

Funny how it works: YOU are a victim of identify theft, but YOU have to spend countless hours (and perhpas a ton of money) to get things straightened out, whereas the asswipe who stole your identity gets a slap on the wrist at the most.

Honey, if you're poor, you are going to have to pay far more than Mr. or Ms. RichyRich.

Your worth, these days, is completely dependent upon the size of your bank account and your credit score.

Neither of them very good? Well, tough shit. That's just how it is, in this modern world.

Welcome to the Bush/Republican world.x(

And pardon me, I must go kill myself now, because I'm deeply in debt, and have to file for bankruptcy. (Mods, I'm being sarcastic here...I will NOT allow the RW bastids to get me THAT far down!).

[fasttense]

5. Oh, well that makes a lot of sense.

Charge more money to people who are having money problems.

We all know the solution to bad credit is more money. Seriously, If you had more money you wouldn't be having credit problems. Because you weren't lucky enough to be born into American royalty, you get to pay more on your insurance.

The dancing supremes again do the jig for their masters while they dance on the bodies of middle class Americans. These black robed juntas will ensure we revert back to the 1800, even without the bushes.

[SeattleGirl]

7. You think the same way I do, fasttense.

How much more money could these companies get by REALLY working with people to help them come up with a good repayment plan? I am in a situation where I have to file for bankruptcy, though I'm not sure yet if it will be Chapter 7 or 13. Either way, the creditors lose, because they aren't going to reap all the interest, finance, and late fee charges.

Well, I am responsible for my bills, but the creditors are responsible for the fact that they refused my offers of what I could pay, just because they had to be the top dawg: "Well, if you CHOOSE not to pay....." Hey, asshole, I'm not chossing not to pay; I'm just tellng you that I can't pay a brazillion dollars right now; I can only pay X amount. You wanna refuse that money? Fine. I have two words for you:

FUCK.

YOU.

But I know those words will fall on deaf ears. I bet you masturbate every night over the credit reports of those of us who are in bad financial situations.

Once agan:

FUCK.

YOU.

I hope that every morning, when you look in the mirror, you see the monstor that you are, staring back at you.

How in the hell do you sleep at night, after all you do during the day?

You'd better hope that you never, EVER, land in the same situation that I, and so many others, find ourselves in right now. Because I guarantee you, if you do, you will RUE the day you ever became a collections agent.

[meegbear]

6. One of the good things about Massachusetts car insurance ...

it's regulated by the state, so they control, in part, how much insurance can increase/decrease across the board, factors, etc.

The next time you see an auto insurance company ad on TV, like GEICO, Progressive, etc and (try to) read the small print and you will see that they don't do business in Massachusetts.

While I support free enterprise and want competition, and there are several insurers here, I don't want to a late payment to be justification for paying more.

[MisterHowdy]

8. How does havng a higher credit score make you a more risky driver?

Needs to be asked and explained.

[mrcheerful]

9. Because people with bad credit tend to be poor or working poor and they tend to pay

for rent, heat, and food before they pay for auto insurance. Just like how the insurance companies also charge more for people who live in poor areas. Like in Saginaw Michigan if you live in the 48601 zip code area you pay up to $600 more a year for insurance then if you live in the 48605 area. The difference between the 2 are the 48601 area is where the majority of poor blacks live, 605 is where the white rich live.

I might be wrong on the 48605 as being the zip code for the rich, it could be 48604 or 48606, I forget as I no longer live in the Saginaw area.

[rpannier]

11. I remember way back when they told us that mandatory auto insurance would lower our rates

I'm still waiting to reap that windfall.

[BanzaiBonnie]

13. Me too

The insurance companies said that if everyone was paying their share by being insured that all insurance premiums would go down. Surprise Surprise, it never happened.


And the actual price "we the people" have paid? More people in jail, at our expense, because of driving while uninsured.

[mrcheerful]

14. Even more amazing is now insurance companies in Michigan have direct contact with police

so if your driving without insurance but have good proof of insurance papers, the police can now check those papers out on their dash board computers if you let your insurance laspe. My SO's sister just got a $500 fine for driving without insurance and using good proof of insurance papers. From what I been hearing the police and insurance companies are trying to get a law so people can be charged for doing that.

[blueworld]

10. When will taxpayers have more rights than corporations?

If we're behind on our bills with a less than stellar credit rating, we still have to drive to work. If we drive, we have to have insurance. So the law forces us to buy something at inflated rates which take more of our salaries so our credit ratings will continue to suffer...but we'll never know how to fix any of it (if we could) because it's all secret.

They've finally found the perpetual motion machine & they're using it to bleed the native workers. Chapter 2: Guest workers.

Some days I fantasize about a National Screw Work Day, where we all stay home one day to protest the fact that we work primarily for CEO's, lobbyists, politicians & judges.:argh:

[rpannier]

12. The two things that irritated me the most were...

1. It was unanimous. Unf**king believable.

2. Souters rationale was so incredibly ignorant.

[Nite Owl]

15. I had a run in with my insurance company

last year over this. On my homeowners insurance they said that I did not get the 'best' rate because of a 'credit score'. They do not use the credit score that we can get they have their own. They said it was because I did not get any new credit cards. I have no mortgage, no debt whatsoever, I pay every bill on time and use credit cards instead of cash and pay them when the bill comes in full but I didn't extend my credit to new card offers. To them this is not responsible enough. They system that they us is not open to us. I got my credit report from one of the agencies and there was nothing bad on it at all. They use some company whose name eludes me, begins with a C and they did something with the GOP voter lists in FL.