Not at fault accident - How does this affect insurance when switching providers | GTAMotorcycle.com

Not at fault accident - How does this affect insurance when switching providers

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mattpg

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I had a no fault accident back when I got my bike. It sucked, only had the bike for 2 months when a driver decided to cross the road without looking. Long story short I was in the right lane and a car was approaching from a parking lot on my left trying to cross the road completely to another parking lot across the street. I thought he was merging, but unfortunately he wasn't. I ended up with nothing more than a bruise, but it could've been a lot worse. The officer who showed up talked to the other driver and thankfully he owned up to the fact it was completely his fault. It was deemed no fault on my insurance.

Problem is, I was with an insurance provider that isn't exactly idea. It's known for new riders considering the higher risk, and therefore tends to be more pricy than others.

It's been 2 years and now that I want to switch insurance companies to something that may be a little bit more reasonable, I'm faced with the question on every sign-up page. "Any claims in the last 5 years?". Considering the accident was 100% not my fault, and even the officer said there was nothing I could've done, am I still expected to say yes to this question. How will this affect my rates?

Cheers!
 
You always have to answer honestly or you risk getting hammered for misrepresentation or fraud. You have had a claim but not an at-fault accident. Not sure how that affects your rates.
 
"ended up with nothing more than a bruise"
Question they asked is did you make a claim.
You did not really say if you actually made an insurance 'claim' or not :unsure:
 
When I moved to the GTA many years ago my wife was involved in 2 Not At Fault accidents in about 6 months (rear ended on QEW and red lighter runner near Square 1). At that time my insurance company said that even though they were declared not at fault they were looking at her policy to see if they wanted to continue to insure (they did). So, while I agree with others that the accident should not impact your rates, with Canada's insurance industry you never know. Good luck.
 
Your old insurance company can provide you with a letter indicating that the accident was 100% not at fault on request for the purpose of shopping new insurance companies...and be sure to tell prospective new insurers that you have such letter and can send it to them upon request.

The question being at this point is...did you file a claim? And did the insurance company (NOT the police) rate the accident as 100% not at fault as well? What the police decide and what the insurance company decides can be two different things.

A finding of even partial fault, or a dollar payout, unfortunately, can indeed result in an increase even if you're not at fault so far as the police were concerned.
 
Trials said:
"ended up with nothing more than a bruise"
Question they asked is did you make a claim.
You did not really say if you actually made an insurance 'claim' or not :unsure:
Click to expand...

While I ended up with nothing more than a bruise, the bike wasn't so lucky. They marked it as totalled at first and then ended up actually repairing. I think it was about $4000 worth of damage. It was either hit the curb or bodycheck the car and hope to god he stopped, which thankfully he did.

I did end up getting my insurance involved due to multiple factors. The guy who hit me was young, just purchased his first car, and wouldn't have had the money to pay out cash. There was no internal damage, but the damage to the body of the bike was a good amount.

PrivatePilot said:
Your old insurance company can provide you with a letter indicating that the accident was 100% not at fault on request for the purpose of shopping new insurance companies...and be sure to tell prospective new insurers that you have such letter and can send it to them upon request.

The question being at this point is...did you file a claim? And did the insurance company (NOT the police) rate the accident as 100% not at fault as well? What the police decide and what the insurance company decides can be two different things.

A finding of even partial fault, or a dollar payout, unfortunately, can indeed result in an increase even if you're not at fault so far as the police were concerned.
Click to expand...

Good call. I'll contact them and ask. I'm rather certain it was marked by my insurance company as 100% not at fault.
 
Your rates should not go up. I had just switched to my current provider 3 years ago and got taken out by a a BMW driver. No police involved but we both filed an accident report. Cop at accident report centre told me I would be deemed 50% at fault even though the car cut me off making a right turn from the lane to the left of me. I explained it to my insurance company, they got the accident reports from both me and the other driver and right away said that I'm 100% not at fault. The bike was written off and I bought it since it wasn't deemed salvage, so they paid me out for the bike and I paid them a small fee to buy the bike back and keep it on the street. I'm currently shopping for cheaper insurance and have been disclosing that I had one NOT at fault claim as you should as well. So far I've managed to find better rates than I'm paying.
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