When you buy car insurance, you need to make sure you’re buying coverage both for yourself and for your car. For yourself also includes protecting your personal assets against lawsuits. Keep reading to learn more about how you can get full coverage.
What Car Insurance Do You Need?
There are several different things you need to be protected against.
- Damage to your car from accidents. This is covered by collision coverage.
- Damage to your car caused by theft, weather, falling objects while you’re parked, and other non-weather hazards are covered by other than collision coverage. This is sometimes also called comprehensive coverage.
- Harm you cause to others, including property damage and physical injuries is covered by liability coverage.
- Your doctor’s bills from accident injuries are covered by medical payments coverage or Personal Injury Protection.
- If someone else’s insurance would have paid, but they didn’t buy insurance or have enough insurance, your uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage kicks in.
Can I Buy a Full Coverage Policy?
There is no such thing as a full coverage car insurance policy. Full coverage is just a phrase people use to mean that you bought all of the different coverages. Each coverage is an option on your insurance policy that you have to select and pay an additional premium. Everything is combined into a single insurance policy and bill.
Full coverage can also mean that you selected the highest possible insurance limits for each coverage. For example, if you buy the legal minimum liability policy and the limit is lower than many cars cost, you can’t say you’re fully covered. If you’re at-fault in an accident with a more expensive car, you’ll probably end up having to pay the other driver what your insurance doesn’t cover.
Does Full Coverage Mean Everything is Covered?
Even if you buy full coverage, this doesn’t mean that insurance will cover everything that could possibly happen. To begin with, there could be injuries or property damage that add up to more than your policy limits. Car insurance policies often also have exclusions, such as accidents while you were driving drunk, that could mean certain incidents aren’t covered or only have limited coverage.
To make sure you’re covered, you may want to look to other types of insurance coverage. This might be a personal umbrella policy to extend your liability protection, better health insurance, or disability coverage in case you’re unable to work.
How Do I Get the Right Coverage Without Paying Too Much?
Some insurance companies might try to sell you a policy that leaves you underinsured by cutting your coverage to give you a lower price. Others may sell you multiple types of coverage that duplicate each other, or you could do this on your own if you buy each coverage from multiple places.
Your insurance agent can help you review your current insurance coverage and financial situation to help make sure you’re fully covered without buying excess coverage. Contact The Don Neeley Agency to set up an appointment or find out more.
