Auto Insurance
The Boston Globe Consumer Beat Column.
The question is taking on new urgency now as state officials begin efforts to revamp the Massachusetts auto insurance system. One of the chief reasons the average premium in Massachusetts costs more than $1,000 a year is the fact that drivers here file more auto insurance claims than anyone else in the country.
Getting to the root of the problem – the key to finding a way to improve the situation – is not so easy. Based on interviews with highway safety, insurance, and law enforcement officials, there is no single cause for the high level of accidents here. It appears to be a combination of unusually aggressive drivers, periodic bad weather, lax law enforcement, insurance fraud, and too many cars being driven on an antiquated and confusing road system.
Daniel Johnston, president of the Automobile Insurers Bureau of Massachusetts, estimates the average premium could be cut by about 20 percent if the state could just lower its claim-filing rate to the level in Rhode Island. Rhode Island ranks third-highest in the nation on claim frequency, but its rate is still about 25 percent less than Massachusetts.
“There are a lot of savings at stake,” Johnston said. “But it’s almost an imponderable feat to get down to that level of accidents. The number in Massachusetts never seems to move very much.”
Massachusetts has led the nation in auto insurance claims for at least two decades….
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