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Discounts Everywhere

Do you like discounts?  I know I do!  In fact, I don’t now anyone that doesn’t like to save money!  There are numerous factors that can determine the type of discounts you are eligible to receive on your car insurance.  Your gender, age, location, and driving record are the most common discounts that most of us either know about, hear about, and/or currently receive.  However, the majority of us out there have no idea how many other discounts are available – and if we don’t know about them, then we can’t ask about them, and then we can’t receive them!

You can potentially get discounts for – age, gender, location, driving record, driving training courses, multiple vehicles, policy bundling, being a good student, maintaining low mileage, having a low-risk profession, having a public service career, holding a degree in a specifc occupation, have memberships to  auto clubs, credit unions, alumni organizations ( and more), bing in the military, being a federal employee, paying your policy in full – and SO MUCH MORE.

That is nowhere near an all encompassing list of potential discounts.  Speak to your insurance agent as soon as possible and see how much money you could be saving with all these “hidden” discounts!

 

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Trick-or-Treat Safety

Halloween will be here in three days. I remember when I was younger, I would count down the days until I would be able to show-off my costume at school and then spend the evening filling a pillowcase with c andy from the house around my neighborhood. While Halloween doesn’t seem to be the same huge event as it was during my day, there are still tons of families that celebrate and take their children trick-or-treating. Now, more than ever, it is important to plan ahead and keep you children safe and always have a chaperone.

You can protect your children and allow them to have fun by starting with a safe costume that fits. Make sure it has some sort of reflective capabilities so it can be seen a night – especially by drivers. You always want to opt for face paint over a mask and make sure your child can see clearly. For extra safety, have everyone carry a flashlight.

While walking the neighborhoods, always cross in the appropriate areas and look both ways – multiple times. Make sure kids stay on the sidewalks or walking paths and consider putting a temporary ban on all electronic devices to keep eyes and heads up and alert.

If you opt to drive through the neighborhood, stay off your phone and watch the road. Children can be unpredictable and dart into the street at any time. Go slow and use hazards if needed. Drive on the correct side of the road and avoid blocking any entrances or exits.

It is VERY possible to be safe and have a great time!

halloween_safety

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Child safety seats

Child safety seats

Make sure your child is always properly secured when you drive.

Using a car seat correctly can prevent injuries, but wrong usage is very common. Even a small mistake in how the seat is used can cause serious injury in a crash.

Tips to ensure you are using a child car seat correctly

  1. Never put an infant in the front seat of a vehicle with a passenger air bag.
  2. Route harness straps in lower slots at or below shoulder level.
  3. Keep harness straps snug and fasten the clip at armpit level.
  4. Make sure the straps lie flat and are not twisted.
  5. Dress your baby in clothes that allow the straps to go between the legs. Adjust the straps to allow for the thickness of your child’s clothes. Do not use bulky clothes that could increase slack in a crash.
  6. To keep your newborn from slouching, pad the sides of the seat and between the child’s legs with rolled up diapers or receiving blankets.
  7. Put the car seat carrying h andle down when in the car.
  8. Infants must ride in the back seat facing the rear of the car. This offers the best protection for your infant’s neck.
  9. Recline the rear-facing seat at a 45-degree angle. If your child’s head flops forward, the seat may not have reclined enough. Tilt the seat back until it is level by wedging firm padding such as a rolled towel, under the front of the base of the seat.
  10. All new car seats are now required to come equipped with top tether straps. A tether strap is a belt that is attached to the car seat and bolted to the window ledge or the floor of the car. They give extra protection and keep the car seat from being thrown forward in a crash. Tether kits are also available for most older car seats. Check with the manufacturer to find out how to get a top tether for your seat. Install it according to instructions. The tether strap may help make some seats that are difficult to install fit more tightly.

Child Safety Seats

Do not use a car seat if any of the following apply

  1. It is too old. Look on the label for the date it was made. If made before January 1981, the seat may not meet strict safety st andards and its parts are too old to be safe. Some manufacturers recommend using seats for only 6 years.
  2. It does not have a label with the date of manufacture and model number. Without these, you cannot check on recalls.
  3. It has been in a crash. If so, it may have been weakened and should not be used, even if it looks all right.
  4. It does not come with instructions. You need the instructions to know how to install and use the car seat properly. Do not rely on the former owner’s instructions. Get a copy of the manual from the manufacturer.
  5. It has cracks in the frame of the seat.
  6. It is missing parts. Used seats often come without important parts. Check with the manufacturer to make sure you can get the right parts.

To find out if your child safety seat has been recalled, you can call the Auto Safety Hotline ( 888-DASH-2-DOT ). If the seat has been recalled, be sure to follow the instructions for the recall or to get the necessary parts. You should also get a registration card for future recall notices from the Hotline.

For more information about infant or toddler car seats, go to the Web site of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety at (www.highwaysafety.org). Also check out the National SafeKids Campaign (http://www.safekids.org) which offers a free Child Car Seat Locator which allows you to enter your child’s age and weight, and get back a list of recommended car seats. Another good source of information on car seats is the American Academy of Pediatrics website (http://www.aap.org/family/), which offers a detailed shopping guide to car seats.

Is your child ready for a regular seat belt?

Keep your child in a car seat for as long as possible. When he or she is big enough, make sure that seat belts in your car fit your child correctly. The shoulder belt should lie across the shoulder, not the neck or throat. The lap belt must be low and flat across the hips, not the stomach. The child’s knees should bend easily over the edge of the vehicle seat. Seat belts are made for adults. If the seat belt does not fit your child correctly, he or she should stay in a booster seat until the belt fits.

Never tuck the shoulder belt under the child’s arm or behind their back.

Use lap belts only as a last resort. Try to get a lap-shoulder belt installed in your car if it doesn’t already have one. If you must use a lap belt, make sure it is worn tight and low on the hips, not across the stomach.

Source: Insurance Information Institute; www.iii.org

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Air bag safety

Air bag safety

Air bags save thous ands of lives each year, according to The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). In frontal crashes, air bags reduce deaths among drivers by about 30 percent and among passengers by 27 percent.

Air Bag Safety

Air bags, however, can be dangerous. If small children sit unbelted in the front seat, they can be catapulted into the path of a deploying air bag, which inflates with great force. This risk also applies to small adults—who must sit close to the steering wheel in order to reach the pedals—pregnant women and the elderly. Infants in rear-facing safety seats on the passenger side can be severely injured because their heads are in the direct path of an inflating air bag. If your airbag is stolen or it deploys, you must get a new one, but you will be reimbursed under the comprehensive portion of your auto insurance policy.

Preventing air bag injuries

Drivers should have all children sit in the backseat wearing a safety belt. Infants should be placed in rear-facing car seats and put in the backseat. Small adults should move the seat back so that their breastbone is at least 10 inches from the air bag cover.

If this is not possible, air bag switches can be installed so that the vehicle owner has the option of turning the bag off or on, depending on the situation. In January 1998, NHTSA allowed auto dealers and repair shops to begin installing air bag cut-off switches. Before the switch can be installed, vehicle owners must complete a four-step process:

  1. Obtain an information brochure and request form from NHTSA, dealerships or repair shops
  2. Return the form to NHTSA
  3. Receive authorization from NHTSA after it reviews the case
  4. Take the vehicle to the service shop along with the authorization from NHTSA which certifies that the owner has read the brochure and met one of the four eligibility classifications:
    1. Rear-facing infant seat can be in the front (necessary if the vehicle has no back-seat)
    2. Driver’s seat cannot be adjusted to keep more than 10 inches between the driver and the steering wheel
    3. Putting a child 12 or under in the front seat can not be avoided
    4. Having a medical condition that puts them at risk of injury when an air bag deploys.

Source: Insurance Information Institute; www.iii.org

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Shopping for a safe car

 

Shopping for a safe car

Not only do vehicles vary in size and color, they can also vary in safety.

There are still important safety differences, and some vehicles are safer than others. Many automakers offer safety features beyond the required federal minimums. The following safety features should be considered when purchasing a car:

Crashworthiness

These features reduce the risk of death or serious injury when a crash occurs. You can get a rating of crashworthiness from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s Web site (http://www.highwaysafety.org).

Vehicle structural design

A good structural design has a strong occupant compartment, known as the safety cage, as well as front and rear ends designed to buckle and bend in a crash to absorb the force of the crash. These crush zones should keep damage away from the safety cage because once the cage starts to collapse, the likelihood of injury increases rapidly.

Vehicle size and weight

The laws of physics dictate that larger and heavier cars are safer than lighter and smaller ones. Small cars have twice as many occupant deaths each year as large cars. In crashes involving smaller and larger vehicles, heavier vehicles drive lighter ones backwards, decreasing the forces inside the heavier car and increasing them in the lighter car.

Restraint systems

Belts, airbags and head restraints all work together with a vehicle’s structure to protect people in serious crashes. Lap/shoulder belts hold you in place, reducing the chance you’ll slam into something hard or get ejected from the crashing vehicle. If you aren’t belted, you’ll continue moving forward until something suddenly stops you – often a hard interior surface that will cause injuries.

  • Shoulder belts are on inertia reels that allow upper body movement during normal driving, but lock during hard braking or in a crash. Belt webbing is stored on the reel, and during a frontal crash any slack in the webbing can allow some forward movement of your upper body. Then you could strike the steering wheel, dashboard or windshield. This problem is addressed in some cars with belt crash tensioners that activate early in a collision to reel in belt slack and prevent some of the forward movement.
  • Airbags and lap/shoulder belts together are very effective. However in some circumstances, a deploying airbag can cause serious injuries and even death. The greatest risk of injury occurs when you are on top of, or very close to an airbag when it starts to inflate. Choose a car that allows you to reach the gas and brake pedals comfortably without sitting too close to the steering wheel. Some cars offer telescoping steering column adjustments that may help.
  • Side airbags are designed principally to protect your chest. They may also keep your head from hitting interior or intruding structures.
  • Head restraints are required in the front seats of all new passenger cars to keep your head from being snapped back, injuring your neck in a rear-end crash. But there are big differences among head restraints. Some are adjustable, and others are fixed. They also vary in height and how far they are set back from the head. To prevent neck injury, a head restraint has to be directly behind and close to the back of your head. Look for cars that have this type of restraint. If the restraints are adjustable, make sure they can be locked into place. Some don’t lock, so they can get pushed down in a crash.

Anti-lock brakes

When you brake hard with conventional brakes, the wheels may lock and cause skidding and a lack of control. Anti-lock brakes pump brakes automatically many times a second to prevent lockup and allow you to keep control of the car. If you were trained to brake gently on slippery roads or pump your brakes to avoid a skid, you may have to unlearn these habits and use hard, continuous pressure to activate your antilock brakes. Anti-lock brakes may help you keep steering control, but they won’t necessarily help you stop more quickly.

Daytime running lights

Daytime running lights are activated by the ignition switch. They are typically high-beam headlights at reduced intensity or low-beam lights at full or reduced power. By increasing the contrast between a vehicle and its backgrounds and making the vehicles more visible to oncoming drivers, these lights can prevent daytime accidents.

On the road experience

Other design characteristics can influence injury risk on the road. Some small utility vehicles and pickups are prone to rolling over. “High performance” cars typically have higher-than-average death rates because drivers are tempted to use excessive speed. Combining a young driver and a high-performance car can be particularly dangerous.

Source: Insurance Information Institute; www.iii.org

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What to do when your vehicle breaks down

 

What to do when your vehicle breaks down

Follow some of these steps if your vehicle breaks down, and take extra precaution if you are in a busy intersection or on a highway.

Getting out of the car at a busy intersection or on a highway to change a tire or check damage from a fender bender is probably one of the worst things you can do. The Insurance Information Institute (I.I.I.) recommends the following precautions when your car breaks down:

  1. Never get out of the vehicle to make a repair or examine the damage on a busy highway. Get the vehicle to a safe place before getting out. If you’ve been involved in an accident, motion the other driver to pull up to a safe spot ahead.
  2. If you can’t drive the vehicle, it may be safer to stay in the vehicle and wait for help or use a cell phone to summon help. St anding outside the vehicle in the flow of traffic, under most circumstances, is a bad idea.
  3. Carry flares or triangles to use to mark your location once you get to the side of the road. Marking your vehicle’s location to give other drivers advance warning of your location can be critical. Remember to put on your hazard lights!
  4. In the case of a blowout or a flat tire, move the vehicle to a safer place before attempting a repair – even if it means destroying the wheel getting there. The cost of a tire, rim or wheel is minor compared to endangering your safety. Tips provided by the Insurance Information Institute, Inc. (http://www.insurance.info)

Source: Insurance Information Institute; www.iii.org

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Road Rage

Road rage. You hear about it, you know what it is, however when is the last time you actually were involved in it? Being in the insurance industry, you can bet that I hear about road rage, its effects on driving habits, premiums for auto insurance and so on. I’m a trained professional, so I would never fall into that trap I know so much about and take it out on another driver, or would I?

I’m driving home from the office, minding my own business. The street I’m driving on begins to narrow, well it always does that after all. However today there appears to be some parties in progress. There are rows of cars parked on both sides of the street and I immediately notice no less than ten valet scurrying up and down the street picking up and dropping off cars. Being the careful, well trained vehicle operator that I am, I slow down for safety.

After a few moments, I’m at a complete halt; not really much of a choice with cars on both side of the already narrow street and people walking around and valet personnel hopping and jumping about. Soon I’m inching my way up, taking turns with cars coming down the street, I pull to the left, the car passes, I migrate up a car length while the opposing traffic does the dose-e-do with me. This is the safe, polite and in all truth only way to slowly crawl up the street and we’ve all done it before. Haven’t we?

From what appears to me as out of the blue, a car whips around the corner and I would have sworn connected its front bumper to my rear bumper. As I’m inching my way along, this car is for all intense and purposes, attached to me. After a few duck and cover operations trading space to let oncoming cars go by and then moving along myself, this car, or more accurately this driver starts honking at me. It’s a shame that a car horn only signify objects in front of you and not behind, because if I had the ability to honk back at him, I would certainly have opted to do so.

After honking at me for a solid minute give or take, I would have loved to let him pass, however alas, there is barely enough room for one car to get by let alone one car pass another. So, I do what any conscientious law abiding driver would do – I stop. Completely stop and wait for my little attached to my bumper tumor to take a few breaths and relax. Sure, in hindsight, I can see how this would probably not accomplish that at all, and in fact it didn’t. It royally pissed this guy off.

Being the uber-social fella I am, I figure if I roll down my window and wave to him, smile, perhaps make the “calm down” gesture, he will get my drift and actually, well, calm down and relax. After rolling my window down I do just that and wouldn’t you know it, I can hear him, well, saying, cursing at any rate, trying to communicate back to me. Ok, so maybe I should just keep moving then. So I keep moving up, stop, pull to the right let a car go by, go up a little more, rinse and repeat.

At long last I make it to a place where there actually is room for a car to get around me, apparently a spot a valet didn’t yet fill and my little growth takes the opportunity to speed right around me. I’m expecting “the look” or worse, so I put on my best and most friendly smile. Instead of any communication human to human, he instead pulls infront of me and slams on his breaks bringing me and all cars behind to a halt. I can’t say screeching halt, as much as that would make this sound so much more dramatic, after all we are only going a few miles an hour at best. I sigh and say to myself, ok, get it out of your system and we’ll all move on. Sure enough, after a minute or so and people behind me begin to honk, he starts moving along. All is forgotten and we’re all moving along again, same pace, just a new leader in the pack, him.

Uh oh. Now he pulls over and waits to be passed. I exhale and just drive on past, not even turning my head to engage him. Sadly, he is not ready to live and let live. Tires smoking leaps behind my car, almost hitting the car that was behind me and again re-attaches his front bumper, fugitively speaking, to my rear bumper. Now I’m spooked. I’m not going to let this dude follow me to my front door, so I take the first opportunity to turn on to a street, hoping he will pass. Nope. No dice, he turns with me.

With my luck for the day, I have turned onto a cul-de-sac and have no choice but to turn around and head back and surprise surprise he has pulled over and rolled his window down to have a little chit-chat with me. So be it. I slowly pull up, with no other option, and our two driver windows are only a foot apart. I stop and open my window.

He asks what I was doing, and although I think it was pretty self evident, I decide to give him an honest answer. I tell him I was driving carefully up the street. He says I was holding up all the traffic, and I explain to him that I was really going as fast as was physically possible and he really should just relax, it’s always better to drive and error on the side of caution. Next he wants to know why I had the “audacity” to stop in front of him. Again, I smiled and gave him an honest answer, “to give you a few seconds to calm down.” He tilts his head to the side studying me to see if I’m serious and then smiles and says, “ok, well take care and have a great day.” Not even the slightest hint of sarcasm in his voice either, oddly enough. I pay him the same respect back and we both pull away.

I notice he drives the other way, back down the street, meaning he actually was following me, at least for a while to follow me, not to get to anywhere specific in the direction I was traveling. That won’t give me too many nightmares.

At the end of all of this, I’m left in my driveway thinking it all over. What did I do wrong, where did I go wrong? Leave a comment below and you tell me who you think was in the right, or wrong.

Karl Susman, Agent

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Do You Own a Classic Car?

It’s usually easy to tell who owns an antique or classic car. That’s the guy at the head of the parade. He putters along enjoying the scenery while a parade of motorists forms in his wake. He takes life a little slower—well, maybe a LOT slower—than the rest of the human race.

Ever wonder why they call it the human “race”? Kind of like the rat race…most of us speed along at sixty or seventy mph, sometimes faster. Then you come to the man in the 1912 Buick. This guy knows how to relax. Just mosey along at thirty mph tops in your antique car and let the rest of the world zoom around you. “Taking your time” attains a whole new meaning when you’re following him.

Why spend your life rushing around when you can kick back and enjoy the view from one of these venerable old machines? My friend Barb says her uncle owns a 1912 Buick painted Christmas green and red. It goes well with his long, bushy white beard. Everybody notices when he goes out on the town, and not just because half of them are stuck behind him.

If you’re tempted to fume and fuss because the clock is ticking while you crawl along, try thinking about a time when life was lived at a more genteel pace. Women wore hats and white gloves. Men opened doors for them and dealt with chores like turning the crank to start the car. There’s a lot to be said for life in the slow lane. Give it a try.

The National Motorists Association advises that newbies to the classic car field use caution when buying. Be skeptical if the car has unusually low mileage or if the seller says he’s just helping a friend get the car sold. Be sure to take a test drive, and go early so you can start the car when the engine is cold. Also make sure the car can pass safety and emissions tests. Be particularly careful if the car is sold “as is.”

Whether it’s an antique more than twenty-five years old or a classic between fifteen and twenty-five, your venerable car needs extra care and special insurance. Antique and classic car insurance covers all those things that could happen to your favorite automobile. Insurance for a classic car is far different from regular auto insurance.

One of the great advantages of antique and classic car insurance is that you get more coverage for less money. This is largely because most of these older automobiles don’t go zooming along at seventy mph. They’ve earned the right to go through life at a slower pace. Besides, people who own these wonderful classic autos don’t usually drive them on a daily basis. That lovely antique stays in the garage until it’s time to go on tour to the classic and antique auto shows.

Another benefit of purchasing special classic car insurance is the ability to set an agreed on value with the insurance broker. Special cars appreciate as the years pass instead of losing value. Insurance companies recognize this and provide for the difference in price for the automobiles and the parts and care needed when they must be repaired.

That 1912 Buick requires tires made by h and because manufacturers don’t produce them. This is just one example of the added cost of keeping a specialty car in good repair. So enjoy life with your old beauty. Take the slow lane, but make sure you’re covered with a good insurance policy. You’ll have peace of mind and a fatter wallet.

Susman Insurance Agency

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