How Would Insurance Company Know How Many Miles You Drive?

[kaneohe]

A number of yrs ago State Farm offered an alternate rate plan for autos where if you drove low miles annually, you might get a lower rate. To document that you had to send in the odometer reading at renewal time annually.

Now they are saying that they will get that info from a 3rd party so no need to send in anything. Having trouble understanding how they would do that since the car might go to mechanic 1x per year and not necessarily at renewal time.
Having trouble believing that small businesses would be monitored and by who?

Are they monitoring gas purchases and guessing mpg?

 

[Big_Hitter]

state inspection, mileage from dealership, maybe they are tracking your phone, who knows?

what if you drive a tesla, no gas to track there?

 

[wolf]

Just purchased new car. So added it to my AAA insurance. Total of 3 cars now.
Reviewing my coverage. The AAA rep, showed me the miles I was putting on the 2 older cars. I said, " how do you know?" He said, oh when you have the car serviced, they report the mileage to us.

I said, I do my own servicing? I said, the mileage on my 2 older cars was high.
I asked AAA rep. Can you show me, who/when are you receiving the data.
He was not able to answer the question.

Also, curious. Are others running into this same issue?

In CA, older cars smog/inspection every 2 years. So mileage is recorded by State.
So possible AAA getting that info. (but only every 2 years).

 

[cathy63]

AAA (So Cal chapter) asks me to fill out a form online or by mail every year.

 

[athena53]

What about the "black box" now installed in every car whether you want it or not? Or on-board GPS units? I'm assuming that either collects enough info to determine how far the car has been driven and wouldn't be surprised if the data were being captured.

 

[Aerides]

They might not always know, and I seriously doubt that all (any actually) car servicing dealers and shops report to insurance agents for routine maintenance. I mean, I can't remember that ever being disclosed and one would think you'd have to opt in...

However, if you have a claim? Then they'd know, and want to find out if it was relevant, or if there were some reason they'd want to decline your claim.

I don't think mileage estimates contribute dramatically to premiums, and I'm sure they know most of us fudge lower.

 

[mountainsoft]

A number of yrs ago State Farm offered an alternate rate plan for autos where if you drove low miles annually, you might get a lower rate. To document that you had to send in the odometer reading at renewal time annually.
Now they are saying that they will get that info from a 3rd party so no need to send in anything.

I work from home and "usually" drive less than 3000 miles a year. The last couple of years have been much higher due to unusual circumstances, but 3000 or less is my norm.

My State Farm agent said I qualified for the low mileage rate since I drove less than the 7500 mile national average. I asked if I needed to send them mileage logs or something, and he said it was just based on trust.

I do my own auto repairs, but our county emission testing does record the vehicle mileage every other year. However, despite my higher than average usage the last couple years I still receive the lower mileage rate.

It only saves about $40 over a six month period, but every little bit helps.

 

[Spock]

A lot of newer cars "phone home" whether you want them to or not.

 

[davebarnes]

Every Walmart.com and Amazon.com purchase subtracts miles from the insurance companies' average guess.

 

[HI Bill]

Now they are saying that they will get that info from a 3rd party so no need to send in anything. Having trouble understanding how they would do that since the car might go to mechanic 1x per year and not necessarily at renewal time.

Every State of Hawaii Safety Inspection you do...the data is uploaded to a third-party wirelessly before you leave the inspection station (the company I used to work for ran the program for the State).

 

[TrvlBug]

We have State Farm and IIRC, yearly mileage <4K gets special lower rates. We report mileage every six months. When we take our cars to the dealership for servicing, they report the mileage to Carfax (or whereever Carfax get their info from) which is, I assume, where State Farm gets their occasional verification mileage. Our mom & pop shop did not report our mileage, but since he's retired, I'm stuck with the dealership until I find another great mom & pop shop.

After 4 years old, the cars need to get smogged every 2 years and they also report mileage at that time.

 

[FlaGator]

My car was totaled a few weeks back, and one of the forms I was asked to sign had a mileage number that was not rounded, and was substantially higher than actual.

My guess is there is a data collection company providing that to multiple insurance cos., similar to an MLS, Experian or others. Having spent time in a similar business, there is significant room for improvement in their methodologies.

I'm a privacy hawk when it comes to people/companies digging out info on me that has no relevance to my relationship with them.

If I sign up for auto insurance and the rate is based on the miles I drive, I expect that to be audited.

The idea that some yahoo firm has made a guess as to the miles on my recently destroyed car, and my insurance company has paid for a wildly wrong "guess", to 5 digits no less, is just appalling.

 

[kaneohe]

Found this which seems to agree w/ what State Farm and many of you said: https://bakersfieldnow.com/news/local/investigation-how-companies-monitor-your-car
Carfax (State Farm said) which gets data from many repair places (perhaps mainly major ones), smog checks every 2 yrs.

Perhaps after the initial yrs of self-reported info and if there aren't too many separate bins for rates, State Farm will just assume the historical bins and just spot check w/ the 3rd party info to verify. Also they may put a somewhat higher number on your record and if you are silent, they learned something, and if you protest , then they will correct.

Nothing of newer vintage here w/ GPS coordinates.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised...........when you look at something on Amazon and it gets shown to you multiple times per day for the next wk or month, you know somebody is watching...............

 

[Koolau]

Any car I have insured required me to have a (company) rep look at the mileage at the time. I would assume that if you are on a low-mileage plan, they would check your mileage IF you have a claim. True, after (say) 4 years, you wouldn't know if the 27,000 miles had been driven in the last 4 years or the last 4 months. But, I assume the ins. co. would have a way to check if there were any real question. YMMV (heh, heh.)

 

[FlaGator]

Found this which seems to agree w/ what State Farm and many of you said: https://bakersfieldnow.com/news/local/investigation-how-companies-monitor-your-car
Carfax (State Farm said) which gets data from many repair places (perhaps mainly major ones), smog checks every 2 yrs.

Perhaps after the initial yrs of self-reported info and if there aren't too many separate bins for rates, State Farm will just assume the historical bins and just spot check w/ the 3rd party info to verify. Also they may put a somewhat higher number on your record and if you are silent, they learned something, and if you protest , then they will correct.

Nothing of newer vintage here w/ GPS coordinates.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised...........when you look at something on Amazon and it gets shown to you multiple times per day for the next wk or month, you know somebody is watching...............

Thanks for sharing the article. A few excerpts:
----------------------
"When you come in for any service, it goes into our database, and CARFAX will pull, or take that information from our database, as needed," said service technician Miguel Arcia from Bakersfield's Family Motors Autogroup.

(We report) the VIN, the mileage, the owner of the vehicle, registered owner, any service that has been done to the vehicle,"

"Family Motors ensured it does not get paid to report to Carfax, stating the only value it gets for using the service is free Carfax reports for the used vehicles it sells, which it also shares for free to anyone looking to buy the cars."

"Family Motors Auto Group is definitely not alone when it comes to this. Most service shops at dealerships have a system in place for Carfax to get the data, and it's not optional.

At the center of the debate between the consumer and these companies is the question: Is your vehicle's information personal information?

Carfax said no."
---------------------
This is the credit bureau (Experian/Equifax/Trans Union) model. The only difference is the FTC long ago got regulatory authority over the credit bureaus and determined the info being collected was "personal information".

Carfax's claim that auto service and mileage info is not "personal information" is arguably defensible, but I don't find it particularly strong.

WARNING-public policy speculation - Will only take bad publicity from abuse and a few changes at the FTC for that to change

 

[Bamaman]

I always lie about my annual mileage. We've yet been caught.

 

[Bruceski44]

I always lie about my annual mileage. We've yet been caught.

Wait until [God forbid] you have a serious accident only to find yourself without insurance because the appraiser noted your mileage and they cancel due to your misrepresentation. People talk about avoiding risk in retirement- your behavior could result in huge personal liability. I hope not, but that’s why insurance is so important. Go with God.

 

[aja8888]

I'd like to know how many people on here actually track their auto miles to be sure they stay under the ESTIMATE they gave their insurance agent.

And, of those that do track it, if they go past the estimate, do they immediately call their insurance company and report it to get a higher premium put in place?

 

[Scuba]

DH and I report our mileage honestly and as the year progresses, we check to make sure we’re balancing it out. If we’ve been driving one car a lot more, we switch for a while. Last year mileage on each car was between 4-5K.

 

[blueskyk]

I guess I shouldn't be surprised...........when you look at something on Amazon and it gets shown to you multiple times per day for the next wk or month, you know somebody is watching...............

Mr blueskyk and I are now beginning to see ads for what the other has searched for....this is creepy.

 

[db79]

Insurance carriers purchase a lot of 3rd party data and even share data with each other. Dealers, oil change locations, car fax, emissions testing, auto body shops, etc all observed the vehicles mileage. In the new age of telematics the vehicles themselves can report out the mileage.

 

[LastOfTheBoomers]

Just the other day I was looking at my car insurance online and saw that I had specified 10K miles driven per year on the car - we only have one car - and I dropped it down to 8K
The result was a whopping $4 per year savings!

 

[pjm-7]

Then there is GM' s On-Star. I had the service initially when I purchase my car a few years ago. I was creeped out by it. I would get e-mail messages about "low tire pressure" or some minor thing. I canceled it because I felt like I was being stalked.

Recently, I started getting e-mails that the car was due for its 60,000 mile service. Even though I canceled On-Star they are still tracking me.

 

[Gumby]

I'd like to know how many people on here actually track their auto miles to be sure they stay under the ESTIMATE they gave their insurance agent.

And, of those that do track it, if they go past the estimate, do they immediately call their insurance company and report it to get a higher premium put in place?

I actually do track my mileage and I know what I told my insurance company. The car that I recently gave away racked up 303,000 miles over 11 years, or 26,357 miles per year. I always told the insurance company 28,000 mi/yr just to be conservative. My roadster has average 833 miles per year, but I have always told the insurance company 1000 for the same reason. I have yet to exceed the numbers I give the insurance company.

I try to be accurate because a) its the right and fair thing to do; the premiums are based, in part, on the mileage; and b) I would not want to have a claim denied because I was not accurate.

And yes, I did notify the insurance company when I stopped working in NYC , taking the train every day and hence racking up very few miles on my cars, and started working in CT and driving to work.

 

[redduck]

Mr blueskyk and I are now beginning to see ads for what the other has searched for....this is creepy.

What's even creepier, I'm now beginning to see ads for what you and Mr. blueskyk are searching for.