Saturday, March 7, 2009

Auto Insurance Quotes - Have You Checked What You're Paying Lately?

Recently I spent some time checking our family budget to see where our money goes. I've been doing this on my computer for almost 20 years and so I can compare what costs have gone up and which have stayed the same or even gone down (not many). I analyze my budget both in absolute dollar figures and also by what percentage of the overall budget an item or category accounts for. What I found was that the auto insurance industry has apparently done a much better job at containing costs than, say, the healthcare industry. While our health insurance premiums have skyrocketed, our car insurance generally remained quite reasonable and hasn't really increased any faster than the general cost of living. I don't know if overall insurance and cost of living statistics back up what I found when I analyzed my budget, but I'd say if it seems like you're paying a lot more for car insurance than you used to, it may be time to get some auto insurance quotes.

The reason why I suggest that is because I've found that contrary to what one might expect, if you're a good, long-term customer, you tend to get the worst, and not the best, rates. Looking at my budget, I found that any service that I left alone over the years tended to increase in cost much more quickly than services where I frequently shopped around. Apparently, as a good customer you're being taken for granted and your rates are being jacked up every year whereas new customers get to take advantage of lower and promotional rates that can often save a lot of money. That's hardly fair, and certainly a sign of very shortsighted greed on the part of a lot of service companies. They know most of us like to leave things alone and they take advantage of that.

What that means is that it pays to keep track of expenditures and make sure you're dealing with vendors who treat you fairly and don't just see you as a cash cow. If something seems out of line, it often pays to give a vendor a call and request a better price or a better rate. It absolutely makes sense to do an auto insurance comparison every now and then, even if your current insurance seems reasonable. Doing that is a lot easier than it used to be, thanks to websites where you can get auto insurance quotes online, without any sales pressure at all. The goal is to get an idea of how much different insurance companies would charge you for insuring your vehicle(s) given your circumstances and where you live.

It's amazingly simple to get side-by-side rate comparisons from multiple companies at the same time. This is a great way to find cheap car insurance. Or you may find that your agent has been looking out for you and treating you fairly all along. The point is that it pays to go through your budgets and bills every now and then and make sure you're not paying too much. Taking an hour or two to get auto insurance quotes is time well spent, especially since it's so easy these days to get those side-by-side comparisons.

Chris Robertson is an author of Majon International, one of the worlds MOST popular internet marketing companies on the web.

Learn more about Online Auto Insurance Quotes.

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