Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

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Topic Author
Statch
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Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

We moved to a new state this year, and as part of the move decided to review all our insurance coverages and look for where we could save money. We contacted several companies, gave them our current coverages, and got quotes. We ended up going with Allstate for auto/home/umbrella. For the auto insurance, they quoted us a price that included $500,000/$500,000 coverage for bodily injury. As we went to finalize that insurance (after having signed an application), they told us that because we now also have an umbrella policy with them, they would only write the policy for $250,000 each person/$500,000 per incident because our umbrella policy will cover anything above $250,000 up to $1,000,000. This is a quote from the email I got (after we had signed the application for the insurance): "...on your Auto policy we are going to have to take your bodily injury liability from 500/500 to 250/500. With Allstate, since you are also purchasing an Umbrella, they do not want your liability limits to exceed 250,000. The Umbrella will then come into play if you were to ever reach that limit. This also helps the premium out quite a bit as well."

Has anyone else run into something like this? I talked to the local agent several times about it because the explanation she got from their underwriter doesn't make sense to me (or to her - she is still trying to get more clarification on this, but it's been a week and they haven't answered her). Here's the 'clarification' she got when she asked originally: "they do have those limitations on the auto policy so that the annual aggregate payout is no more than 2,000,000 on any given policy period." If the umbrella policy covers anything up to $1,000,000, then why not write the auto policy for $100,000? Why $250,000? I just suspect that there's a catch in here somewhere...perhaps more stringent exclusions on what the umbrella policy covers? Our previous auto insurance (with Traveler's) did have a $500,000/$500,000 limit for bodily injury. (We have never made an insurance claim of any kind in the last 30 years, nor had any auto accidents or tickets, so it shouldn't have anything to do with risk assessment.)

One of the goals was to get all our insurance with one company, because Traveler's won't cover our home as it's in a flood zone (near the coast), so I really want to understand what's going on here, in case it's legitimate, rather than just take our business elsewhere. (We've saved $450 a year by switching all three insurances but that's not that much money compared to the risk of being under-insured.)

I'd appreciate any insights any of you have into this.
jmg229
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by jmg229 »

I'm not seeing where the concern about being underinsured is. Instead of having 500/500 and a 1 million umbrella, they want you to have 250/500 and a 1 million umbrella. So, either way, you are covered up to 1 million. In the latter case, you have a lower auto premium due to lower limits. This is good for you.
Statch wrote:they would only write the policy for $250,000 each person/$500,000 per incident because our umbrella policy will cover anything above $250,000 up to $1,000,000. ... The Umbrella will then come into play if you were to ever reach that limit."
It sounds like the umbrella coverage you are buying will cover the space from $250,000 to $1,000,000. Why would you want more than $250,000 for auto? It would be redundant and they are correcting that for you.
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TX_TURTLE
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by TX_TURTLE »

I'm based in Texas and used to have Allstate for Auto/Home and they had the exact same requirement, this is, when I added the umbrella policy I had to change the limits of the Auto insurance to the same level they told you. Later I switched to Metlife and it is the same thing.
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Quasimodo
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Quasimodo »

I would guess that Allstate needs to limit their amount of liability because of reinsurance requirements. Even large insurance companies spread the risks they take on by sharing premiums and limits of liability with other companies, which is called reinsurance. Requirements of a particular company's reinsurer wouldn’t be readily apparent to policyholders.

Or it might be for some other reason that has to do with their underwriting approach.

I wouldn’t be concerned about the limit requirements Allstate has, so long as you are satisfied with Allstate's financial stability and coverages.

John
Many wealthy people are little more than janitors of their possessions. | | Frank Lloyd Wright, architect (1867-1959)
mnvalue
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by mnvalue »

jmg229 wrote:It would be redundant and they are correcting that for you.
This.

Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000. Your auto policy, as corrected, has a coverage limit of $250,000 and a deductible of whatever you chose (let's use $1,000 for an example). So on a $1,000,000 liability claim arising from an auto accident, you pay $1,000 (the auto deductible), the auto policy pays $249,000 (the coverage limit of $250,000 minus the deductible of $1,000), and the umbrella policy pays $750,000 (the $1,000,000 coverage limit minus the deductible of $250,000).

If you had a $500,000 limit on the auto policy (and that were allowed by the insurance company), then coordination of benefits would come into play to decide how much the auto policy and the umbrella policy pay out of the duplicated coverage from $250,000 to $500,000. But since both policies are from the same company, that's the same end result for you. You just paid more premiums to get duplicated coverage that provides you no benefit.
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tfb
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by tfb »

mnvalue wrote:Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000. Your auto policy, as corrected, has a coverage limit of $250,000 and a deductible of whatever you chose (let's use $1,000 for an example). So on a $1,000,000 liability claim arising from an auto accident, you pay $1,000 (the auto deductible), the auto policy pays $249,000 (the coverage limit of $250,000 minus the deductible of $1,000), and the umbrella policy pays $750,000 (the $1,000,000 coverage limit minus the deductible of $250,000).

If you had a $500,000 limit on the auto policy (and that were allowed by the insurance company), then coordination of benefits would come into play to decide how much the auto policy and the umbrella policy pay out of the duplicated coverage from $250,000 to $500,000. But since both policies are from the same company, that's the same end result for you. You just paid more premiums to get duplicated coverage that provides you no benefit.
The umbrella coverage is on top of auto coverage. It doesn't have a $250k deductible. On a $1.5 million claim from one person, the auto policy will pay $250k, the umbrella policy will pay $1 million, and you are left with a $250k liability. If your auto policy limit is $500k, you are fully covered to $1.5 million.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

Thanks very much to all of you for the reassuring responses. It had worried me that after I carefully confirmed that all the coverages were the same as for our previous policies, they had seemingly changed it on me at the last minute, and that the local agent said she didn't understand it either. I feel much better now!
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

I posted before seeing tfb's response. Now I'm really confused! That was what I had feared - that they were reducing their liability and increasing mine. tfb, can you tell me where to find this information? I can call my agent, but if she gives me mistaken information (since I'm not sure she understands it herself), I doubt it would help me later to say that she had told me so.
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Quasimodo
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Quasimodo »

I agree with tfb's description of how the limits work. You could ask for a copy of the umbrella policy if you don't already have one and read the section that describes "underlying" or "primary" limits along with how the umbrella limits work.

Personally, I wouldn't be too bothered by having $1.25 million total limits of coverage for an auto accident instead of the $1.5 million you thought they would provide. But if you're uncomfortable because your primary auto limits were lower than before you asked for umbrella coverage, you could buy higher umbrella limits or get a quotation from a different company.

John
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mnvalue
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by mnvalue »

I did some more reading, since tfb clearly disagrees with my understanding of how this works. What appear to be reputable sources are split on this. Allstate is the only unambigous example from an actual insurance company that I've been able to find. They agree with tfb. See page 8: http://www.allstate.com/resources/Allst ... simple.pdf

This is a plus for me. Assuming my insurance company is the same, I actually have $250,000 more in coverage than I thought I did. But it's a loss for the OP.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

Coincidentally, I just got the new Allstate umbrella policy in the mail this afternoon. I compared it with the old Traveler's policy and, to be honest, I still really don't understand how it works. The Traveler's policy says that I must have insurance that is "collectible insurance with limits at least as great as the deductible amounts shown below," then under auto liability, it says, "$500,000 per occurrence. However, if the insured has in force at the time of loss primary insurance with auto liability limits of $500,000 per person/$500,000 per occurrence bodily injury and $100,000 property damage liability, then the deductible amounts applicable to auto liability shall be such limits." That sounds to me like they were saying that the $500,000 the auto insurance would pay for bodily injury per person/per occurrence would be deducted from the $1,000,000 limit the umbrella policy has? So if the claim were for $1,500,000, Traveler's would still only have paid $1,000,000?

I can't find similar language in the Allstate policy, which says that I have to have $250,000/$500,000 underlying insurance. It's likely there, though, and I'm just not seeing it since the answer the agent got seems to me to say that if there were a $1,000,000 claim, the auto insurance would pay $250,000 and the umbrella policy would pay the $750,000, for a total of $1,000,000, so if the total claim were over one million, I'd be liable for the rest.

As I compare the two policies, I also notice that the new Allstate policy gives me coverage of $1,000,000 per occurrence, but places an annual aggregate limit of $2,000,000, which the agent also mentioned in her email when she said they were changing the auto coverage to $250,000/$500,000. I don't find any language in the Traveler's umbrella policy that places an annual aggregate limit. I'm assuming that if there were one, it would have been highlighted, but maybe not.

I really appreciate all responses (and any future ones). Obviously, these are things I need to verify beyond what I read on the Internet :happy but all of this is really helping me clarify the answers I need to get from the insurance company.
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Quasimodo
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Quasimodo »

Umbrella policies are designed to provide limits in excess of the primary auto and general liability limits. So if the umbrella insurance company requires $250,000 primary auto liability limits, and you have those limits, then after the primary auto insurance pays their policy limit of $250,000, the umbrella liability policy provides coverage up to their limit in excess of the $250,000.

So that's total coverage limits of $1,250,000 for a claim, with $250,000 primary auto and $1,000,000 umbrella.

I would be surprised if the umbrella had an "annual aggregate limit" that was higher than the occurrence limit, but I guess it's possible.

John
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

mnvalue, thanks very much for the link. That certainly seems unambiguous. What's odd to me is that they would not offer me $500,000 per person coverage under the auto insurance, even at an additional cost and even though my old insurance did have that. I need to make a visit to the local agent and sit down in person to go over this stuff. If it is in fact this way, it does bother me that this didn't come up until after we had already made the application and paid the deposit.

John, the Allstate policy does say directly that it has a $1,000,000 limit per occurrence and $2,000,000 annual aggregate limit for bodily injury and property damage, and $500,000/$1,000,000 for personal injury. Interesting, I assumed that this was worse than the Traveler's policy, which doesn't specify an annual limit, but maybe not.

After making no claims in 30 years, I know that we're at lower risk of having a large claim...but we're older now, so presumably not as good drivers (I'm certainly not)...and we're retired, so no possibility of making back the money. If the agent confirms that this understanding is correct, we may end up going back to our old insurance.
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tfb
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by tfb »

Statch wrote:If the agent confirms that this understanding is correct, we may end up going back to our old insurance.
Or just buy $2 million umbrella.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

Definitely another option -- good point.
placeholder
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

Here's my American Family agent explaining it to me in email back when:
You will end up having $1,300,000 of coverage on your home, and $1,250,000 coverage on your car.
So I agree with TFB.
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BestWishes
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by BestWishes »

We have all our insurance with State Farm. When we first got our umbrella insurance, State Farm also made us lower our house and car liability coverage. My understanding is also the same as TFB and placeholder.
strafe
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by strafe »

Umbrella insurance is not a uniform product, which is responsible for the disagreement.

Some (in my experience, most) policies are structured like this:
mnvalue wrote: Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000. Your auto policy, as corrected, has a coverage limit of $250,000 and a deductible of whatever you chose (let's use $1,000 for an example). So on a $1,000,000 liability claim arising from an auto accident, you pay $1,000 (the auto deductible), the auto policy pays $249,000 (the coverage limit of $250,000 minus the deductible of $1,000), and the umbrella policy pays $750,000 (the $1,000,000 coverage limit minus the deductible of $250,000).

If you had a $500,000 limit on the auto policy (and that were allowed by the insurance company), then coordination of benefits would come into play to decide how much the auto policy and the umbrella policy pay out of the duplicated coverage from $250,000 to $500,000. But since both policies are from the same company, that's the same end result for you. You just paid more premiums to get duplicated coverage that provides you no benefit.
Other policies are structured like this:
tfb wrote: The umbrella coverage is on top of auto coverage. It doesn't have a $250k deductible. On a $1.5 million claim from one person, the auto policy will pay $250k, the umbrella policy will pay $1 million, and you are left with a $250k liability. If your auto policy limit is $500k, you are fully covered to $1.5 million.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

Thanks to everyone for the responses. It's really helpful to see all the differences, and hopefully this exchange will help someone else who's shopping for umbrella insurance to frame the right questions. I plan to talk to the agent tomorrow, and will report back the results (though obviously that will only apply to the Allstate policy, and it appears that question has already been answered through their own publication).
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

strafe wrote:Some (in my experience, most) policies are structured like this:
mnvalue wrote: Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000.
That's not my experience but does describe the somewhat similar product known as "excess liability" so I think if you check most major insurance companies you'll see that the umbrella is in addition to any current liability insurance you have (which might be none in some cases).
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

Here's an example from GEICO:
So, let's look at an example to help you better understand how an umbrella policy would work to protect you. Let's say you cause an auto accident and the cost of the injuries you cause to others is $500,000. Let's further say that the Bodily Injury limit on your auto insurance is $300,000. Your auto policy will cover $300,000 of the injuries. But who will cover the remaining $200,000? Your umbrella policy will. It will cover the amount above the limit set in your auto policy, up to the limit you choose for your umbrella policy.
mnvalue
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by mnvalue »

placeholder wrote:Here's an example from GEICO:
So, let's look at an example to help you better understand how an umbrella policy would work to protect you. Let's say you cause an auto accident and the cost of the injuries you cause to others is $500,000. Let's further say that the Bodily Injury limit on your auto insurance is $300,000. Your auto policy will cover $300,000 of the injuries. But who will cover the remaining $200,000? Your umbrella policy will. It will cover the amount above the limit set in your auto policy, up to the limit you choose for your umbrella policy.
I saw that page, but I think that's still ambiguous. I have the same problem with the actual language in my policy; I can't tell which way it'd go. Is it covering losses above $300,000 up to losses of $1,000,000 (so $1,000,000 in total coverage) or covering losses above $300,000 up to paying out $1,000,000 (so $1,300,000 in total coverage)?
strafe
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by strafe »

placeholder wrote:
strafe wrote:Some (in my experience, most) policies are structured like this:
mnvalue wrote: Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000.
That's not my experience but does describe the somewhat similar product known as "excess liability" so I think if you check most major insurance companies you'll see that the umbrella is in addition to any current liability insurance you have (which might be none in some cases).
My umbrella insurance policy from Amica, for example, has a $300k deductible, which precisely matches the liability limits of my homeowners and auto policies.
ralph124cf
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by ralph124cf »

mnvalue wrote:
jmg229 wrote:It would be redundant and they are correcting that for you.
This.

Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000. Your auto policy, as corrected, has a coverage limit of $250,000 and a deductible of whatever you chose (let's use $1,000 for an example). So on a $1,000,000 liability claim arising from an auto accident, you pay $1,000 (the auto deductible), the auto policy pays $249,000 (the coverage limit of $250,000 minus the deductible of $1,000), and the umbrella policy pays $750,000 (the $1,000,000 coverage limit minus the deductible of $250,000).

If you had a $500,000 limit on the auto policy (and that were allowed by the insurance company), then coordination of benefits would come into play to decide how much the auto policy and the umbrella policy pay out of the duplicated coverage from $250,000 to $500,000. But since both policies are from the same company, that's the same end result for you. You just paid more premiums to get duplicated coverage that provides you no benefit.
I believe that there is one misstatement of fact in the above. In general the deductible only applies to physical damage to your own vehicle. Liability coverage, for damage to another vehicle or for personal injury does not have any deductible.

Ralph
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

placeholder wrote:
strafe wrote:Some (in my experience, most) policies are structured like this:
mnvalue wrote: Your umbrella policy is a liability policy with a coverage limit of $1,000,000 and a deductible of $250,000.
That's not my experience but does describe the somewhat similar product known as "excess liability" so I think if you check most major insurance companies you'll see that the umbrella is in addition to any current liability insurance you have (which might be none in some cases).
And it just keeps getting more complicated...I never heard of 'excess liability,' so I looked it up. If I'm understanding correctly, the umbrella policy acts as a 'fill-in-the-gap' insurance in that it may cover 'first dollar' liability for things that the underlying auto policy does not cover. What I read said that an 'excess liability' policy acts similarly by providing coverage above the amount of the underlying policy, up to the policy limit, but is more restrictive in that it only covers liability covered by the underlying policy so does not do 'first dollar'. (I also found something that reversed this explanation for the two policies.) I checked the new Allstate policy and it titles itself 'Personal Umbrella Policy Declarations,' but on the page where it lists 'policy coverages and limits of liability,' it calls itself excess liability insurance. I checked the old Traveler's umbrella policy and it makes no mention of 'excess liability.' However, one of the things I found about excess liability said that insurance professionals often use the term umbrella policy interchangeably for both.

So now I really don't know what I have (and I suspect I am not alone). Yet another question for the agent.
scifilover
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by scifilover »

Most Umbrella policies do provide some broadening of coverage over what one gets from the underlying policies. The specifics of these areas differ by company. For example, some cover Libel and Slander (Personal Injury) which is generally excluded on the underlying HO policy. I used to have an umbrella that covered my participation on charitable boards of directors. Some cheap companies call it an umbrella, but it really just excess over the primary. Ask your agent for specifics of what might be covered.

For non-insurance folks, all this limit stuff is gibberish. The rationale comes from the way rates are made. This is a very brief description of how this kind of situation happens.....There is a base auto liab rate for your company. It is based on 10000per person/20000 per occurrence, or whatever are the minimum limits in the state. Then, there is a table of factors which are used to increase the base rate for increased limits. When losses occur, these losses are cut up and put into category by how they affect the layers of increased limits. So, a large loss, say $500,000 in a death claim, only impacts the primary auto rates to the tune of $250k and the balance goes into the umbrella, which Allstate most likely re-insures with another carrier. Large losses can have a disparate effect on rates. This is especially true in smaller states. Since umbrella reinsurance treaties are negotiated over a 3-5 year period, this approach also puts off the day of reckoning. They pay the actuaries a lot of money to play around with the numbers and come up with what is best for the company!

If you want a true umbrella over $500k primary, call around till you find a broker for Lloyds of London. Increase your primary with Allstate, and buy the umbrella from Lloyds. There are other companies who will do the same.
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

strafe wrote:My umbrella insurance policy from Amica, for example, has a $300k deductible, which precisely matches the liability limits of my homeowners and auto policies.
I'm quite interested in these apparent differences between companies as I thought they'd all work the same so could you quote the specifics from the policy on the matter?
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ElJay
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by ElJay »

It is interesting to see the differences from within the insurance companies! A few months ago I got a $1mm umbrella from Amica. I have $500k/$500k auto and the umbrella has a $500 (five hundred dollars) deductible (with the exception of $50k deductible for "loss assessments" which don't apply to me since I don't live in a homeowners association.) The umbrella policy does show my underlying liability limits of auto and home insurance, along with the minimums required for the umbrella, on the auto being $250k/$500k.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

So I talked to both the Allstate and a Traveler's agent today about my questions. It turned out that both of them work the same way: the underlying auto insurance ($250,000/$500,000 for Allstate and $500,000/$500,000 for Traveler's for bodily injury) is essentially the 'deductible' for the $1 million umbrella insurance. I posed the question to each about what would happen if I were in an accident that resulted in a $1.5 million judgment. The answer from each was that the umbrella insurance would cover up to a million dollars minus whatever the auto insurance paid. So if it were Allstate, the auto insurance would pay $250,000 and the umbrella would pay $750,000; if Traveler's, auto would pay $500,000 and the umbrella $500,000 but neither company would pay more than $1 million, so I would be liable for the extra $500,000 (of the hypothetical $1.5 million judgment).

I also asked about the term 'excess liability,' which occurred in the Allstate umbrella policy but not in the Traveler's. Both told me that their umbrella policy covers ONLY the same liability as the auto insurance policy covers, so neither umbrella policy would cover from 'first dollar' on any uncovered liability from the auto policy.

So we are paying overall less in premiums for the new auto/umbrella policy but getting essentially the same coverage. I want to make it clear that I don't mean to appear to be favoring one company over another here, by the way. Traveler's has always been good to us. In this case they wouldn't cover our new home because of its location near the coast, and we wanted all the policies with one company. It's primarily the home insurance where we're seeing the overall decrease; if it had only been a question of auto/umbrella insurance, we probably wouldn't have thought the change worth the hassle.

I asked what it would cost to get an extra $1 million in umbrella coverage. The answer was about $12 a month. We're still thinking about whether to do that.

Thanks again to everyone for the discussion! I wouldn't have known what questions to ask without this. Now I not only feel comfortable with our decision but also like I actually understand what our decision means :->.
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

To get more information I emailed some insurance companies and agents and here are their replies to this question:
I wanted to ask how umbrella insurance works at your company. I've heard different things. If I have 300,000 liability coverage on my home and buy a one million umbrella policy, do I have one million in liability or 1,300,000?
Replies:
Amica wrote: The umbrella provides liability above and beyond your current policies.
Allstate corporate wrote: Thank you for contacting Allstate’s My Account Site where you are always in Good Hands. We have received your reply. Our records indicate that in your example the total coverage with the homeowners and personal umbella policies would be 1.3 million.
Allstate agent wrote: Our umbrella will provide the underlying limit plus the umbrella limit. In your example that would be $1.3M. Attorney fees are covered outside of this limit.
Liberty Mutual wrote: Liberty Mutual offers an umbrella policy, which is a personal liability policy designed to protect your assets. The umbrella policy provides an extra layer of liability coverage beyond that offered by a home or auto policy. The policy limits offered start at $1 million, and can be raised in $1 million dollar increments. Which means if you carry $300,000 on your home and buy a $1 million dollar umbrella policy, you will have $1,300,000 in coverage.
[New: ]
State Farm agent wrote:To answer your first question it Is yes. you would have 1300000 coverage if your house had liab of 300000
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

I think I have now received replies from most of the major insurance companies and all have agreed with TFB and me regarding how umbrella works.
mnvalue
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by mnvalue »

And yet Statch got the opposite answer from one of the same companies (Allstate). I'm not sure what to make of that.
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Statch
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

I don't know what to make of it either. I got the same answer from both Allstate and Traveler's (about a policy I owned or had owned) and I was very clear in what I was asking (or least thought I was). The way I'm looking at it, though, is that the worst case scenario is that I have what they told me I have, and best case is that I actually have better than that. :happy
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Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by placeholder »

mnvalue wrote:And yet Statch got the opposite answer from one of the same companies (Allstate). I'm not sure what to make of that.
I will point out that mine came via email and not what I recall someone telling me.
Topic Author
Statch
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Joined: Mon Apr 08, 2013 2:23 pm

Re: Should I be concerned: auto vs. umbrella insurance

Post by Statch »

Sorry it took me so long to do an update to this. I sent an email to my agent when I saw placeholder's note, quoting those emails, and just got the response:

"Sorry about all the confusion with this Umbrella Policy. The agent in question is right, the total coverage you have on your home is 1.5 mill and your auto is 1.25 mill. (The highest amount that would be paid in each loss.)"

So that confirms placeholder's (and others') understanding of how the umbrella policy works. I can't believe how frustrating this whole experience was.
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