Where's that gecko? thump thump

[RS Motorsport]

Thought since they had spent almost as much as AOL sending out CDs that I should finally call a GEICO representative this morning and get a quote on my motorcycle, car, truck, and trailer.

After providing all the details etc. etc. she asked if I had any other vehicles. I responded 'none with a VIN'. She asked what that meant and I said 'I have a racecar that is not street legal and never driven on the street'.

She started asking questions about it as though she wanted to add it to the policy. I told her I was certain that GEICO would not write collision, but I would at least consider a theft/fire (comprehensive) quote.

She put me on hold, talked to her supervisor, and returned to tell me that they couldn't cover the racecar (okay - no problem) but because I owned a racecar they would only write liability for my car, truck, trailer and motorcycle!! So somehow owning a racecar increases your risk of a comp claim on your other vehicles...

I told her it was not a street car, never had been, wasn't ever on public roads, reiterated that it had no VIN - that it was an asset - like a go cart or a scooter and had nothing to do with my auto insurance.

On hold (again) talked to the supervisor (again) "We don't insure owners that have racecars"

That's right.

I just thought it would be appropriate to let the 66,000 or so SCCA members that have racecars in your family that if you are insured with GEICO that they don't want your business and if you still want to help them get rich you'd better not tell them you have a racecar.

So that foolish gecko better watch out because if I ever see him there will be a thump thump heard and a flat gecko in the rear view (or side view if I catch him on track).

[Bob Wright]

Just remember...insurance companies are not in business to take risk, only our money.

[mark defer]

the real crazy part of all this is that racers are actually probably FAR superior drivers on the street. most racers i know don't drive crazy on the street, don't tailgate 5 feet off someone's bumper, and keep their eyes far down the road instead of on the back of the vehicle in front of them.


mark d

[Purple Frog]

RS,
Obviously you need to sit in on my lawyers desposition training sessions. One learns to be very careful in delivering answers... especially to insurance agents, lawyers, reporters, building inspectors, car salesmen, waitresses, car rental clerks, and auditors.
Score it as another example of my favorite axiom : "No good deed goes unpunished."

[JHaydon]

Do they also refuse car insurance to recreational skydivers or private pilots? How about soldiers who drive tanks on the weekends? Women? Minorities?

And people wonder why I don't trust people in the insurance industry.

[Alan R Guibord]

Frog,
Does your training include wifes and mothers in law??

[Charles Warner]

Better than "thump, thump" is to file a complaint with your State insurance Board. I doubt they can provide statistics to prove people that own race cars are a higher risk regarding street cars. Therefore this may constitute some form of discrimination. It is conceivable that this refusal is illegal and no one has called them on it. At least you'll create a bit of hassle for them as they will have to answer the question.

[Dave Hopple]

RS,
Obviously you need to sit in on my lawyers desposition training sessions. One learns to be very careful in delivering answers... especially to insurance agents, lawyers, reporters, building inspectors, car salesmen, waitresses, car rental clerks, and auditors.
Score it as another example of my favorite axiom : "No good deed goes unpunished."

Frog, I would add Accountants, Mortgage Bankers and Senate Congressional Committees...

-Dave

[DaveW]

From what I've heard, Geico is one of the worst car insurance companies for using ANYTHING against you, whether you are a prospective or a current customer.

One of my pet peeves is their ad: Geico's customer satisfaction rating is 97%. How's your company...

I guess that means that 97% of their customers never filed a claim or had a speeding ticket!
They are rating Geico on their low prices. In this case I think you get what you pay for.

RS Motorsport - maybe you're lucky they turned you down!

[D.T. Benner]

I had one major insurance co. give me a price for my 3 cars and the truck. They were happy to insure all but my wifes convertable! "We don't insure convertables"

[Rick Kirchner]

I ran in to a similar problem with GEICO a few years back when shopping around for better prices. Can't remember the specifics now (wasn't the racecar), but it involved a similar list of ever more probing questions and I finally just told them to kiss off.

Other areas to watch out for - while shopping for a better home policy I had one insurer who refused to give me a quote until I could tell him the breed of my dog. "it came from the pound - mixed breed" was unacceptable. They told me they wouldn't write a homeowner's policy for anyone that owned a pit bull, rottweiler, doberman, german shepherd, mastiff, chow, or any mix of those with something else or unknown mixes. So that's something like 50% of the dog owners in this country (if you even knew when you got the policy that you had to disclose your pet or tell them about acquiring a pet after you got the policy). Now I understand this because those breeds are agressive and protective, but the only dogs that have actually bitten me are those high-strung yappy little things. At least they can't do much damage and you can punt them into the next county!

[Steve Demeter]

What is even better about the dog thing is that poodles are responsible for more dog bites / attacks than any other breed.

But I guess they aren't real dogs.

[Dennis McCarthy]

[size=2]Here's the Gecko![/size]

[Tom Tipsword]

I'm not sure if they do it anymore, but at one time we had evidence that Progressive Insurance was scanning SCCA region web sites to see if any autocross participants cross-referenced to their insured lists. If you were an autocrosser you were cancelled as 'driving in competition'.

[EYERACE]

bless you for your honesty my son......now you know better. next time tell them 1. nothing, 2. that you own an off road vehicle that has no title....."it's an ATV.....all terrain...asphault and concrete and dirt in the paddock 3. nothing.....4 nothing. you actually thought that a company in the business of insuring street cars would be interested in doing something other than that............? like michael corleone said in the Godfather "it's just business"

[GeoffRain]

Did anyone else think it was strange that they were the title sponsor of the Canadian GP today?

[Jerry Santucci 33]

they can sponsor a race, but not insure a race car??????????

[Marshall Mauney]

I just thought it would be appropriate to let the 66,000 or so SCCA members that have racecars in your family that if you are insured with GEICO that they don't want your business and if you still want to help them get rich you'd better not tell them you have a racecar.

Ya know, this sounds like an opportunity for Topeka to do something positive for its membership.

1) Suggestion: Write up your experience as a letter to SportsCar.
2) Suggestion: Let's petition the BOD (and the Big J) to commission a study to determine and prove that SCCA-licensed drivers are actually safer, on average, than other drivers. If you can prove lower risk actuarially, there will be a company that will act on it.
3) Use the results from study above to petition state insurance boards to disallow Geico's 'policy' of not insuring racecar owners (which I suspect is not an actual policy, but a knee-jerk response from a 1st-line supervisor who knows little or nothing about the different types of competition vehicles and what they imply).
4) Could SCCA use their 'captive' market to entice some insurance co. to give us a special deal? They can do credit cards - why not auto insurance?

Of course, if the study proves we're a bad risk......uh, oh...... (but I seriously doubt it)

Thoughts?