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What Should I Tell My Insurance Company if I Ship My Car?

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Home  |  Car Transport   |   What Should I Tell My Insurance Company if I Ship My Car?

For many people, their car is one of the most valuable things they own. Therefore, it only makes sense that they want to be sure it is well protected. Though damage during auto transport is unlikely, there is always the small chance that something could happen to your vehicle. This is the reason why it’s important to make sure your vehicle is insured when it is being transported from one location to another by an auto shipping company. Here are a few things you need to know about shipping insurance before handing your car over to a shipping company.

What is Covered?

Auto shipping companies are required by law to provide insurance for the cars they transport. Most companies have liability and cargo insurance, meaning that your vehicle should be covered for any damage that occurs during transport. However, it is always a good idea to check with the auto shipping company and get a printed copy of their insurance policy. There might be limitations to their policy for certain things like “acts of god” (floods, tornadoes, earthquakes, etc.) Once you are familiar with the company’s insurance policy you can decide whether or not to purchase additional coverage.

What to Ask Your Insurance Company?

In addition to checking with the car shipping company, you should also speak to your own auto insurance provider. Depending on your policy, you vehicle may be covered during transport. You will want to find out from your provider what damages are covered, such as those from weather, debris, theft, and negligence. If your policy does not cover auto transport, you might need to look into adding additional coverage to your vehicle for transport.

Other Information to Tell Your Insurance Company

In addition to general information regarding the policy, you want to notify your insurance company of the shipping company that will be transporting your vehicle as well as the distance your vehicle is being transported. Furthermore, you should remove all items from inside your vehicle and do a complete inspection of the vehicle prior to shipment and document the car’s condition. Upon arrival, you will want to perform another inspection and immediately document any damage. It is critical to report any new damage as soon as possible upon delivery so that you can make a timely claim if needed.

Frequently Asked Questions

Honest Answers to Your Car Shipping Questions

Yes, we always ask for your specific pickup and delivery addresses, if the carrier can get right to the addresses you provide, they will. If the addresses that you give us are not safely accessible for a Multi-car carrier, however, you will need to make arrangements with the driver to meet at a nearby location where the carrier can safely get in and out.

People do it all the time (rarely for free) but the official answer is no.

Not what you wanted to hear, we know, but that is the honest answer.

We are not licensed to broker the shipment of household goods and, likewise, no car carrier that operates in the USA is licensed to transport them from state to state either. Despite what you might be being told by other car shipping companies you may speak with.

Remember, at the end of the day we're all salespeople, and the true answer to this question is not a great selling point.

You will hear a lot of companies tell you that you can put up to 100 pounds of items in the trunk, but that is not entirely true. That fact is that items of that amount are fairly common and the department of transportation is probably not going to split hairs and fine the trucker over items of that amount, provided they are not over their weight limit. They could fine them, however, if they see a vehicle stuffed full of personal items so the car carrier will most likely try to negotiate something with you to cover themselves against any costs they could incur. It's not something we can build into your contract though.

We have a short and helpful video on this topic in our user videos.

Only in rare cases and car carriers will usually charge a premium to make it happen.

All dates given by car carriers are typically estimates and projections.

For this reason (and to keep your cost down) we ask that you build in some flexibility and give us the earliest possible date you would be WILLING to release the vehicle, even though it may not be your preferred date.

We'll put you in direct contact with your car carrier and the driver will also typically call you the afternoon or evening before your pick up and delivery (they won't just show up unannounced, and if they do we want to hear about it). However, car carriers are out on the road battling traffic, weather and any number of other factors that can and do throw them off of their pickup and delivery projections from time to time.

If the projected dates we give you come and you are unable to make contact with your carrier, please call our office immediately so that we may help resolve the situation.

The average transit time from pick up to delivery on any vehicle going coast to coast will average 7 to 10 days. From there you can figure your transit time based on how far your vehicle is traveling, i.e. from either coast to the Midwest might average 3-7 days.

Yes!

Even better, we do not even ask for payment until we have you confirmed for pickup by a safe, reliable, fully insured, direct car carrier. If for any reason you do not ship your car with the carrier that we arrange for you, there is no fee.

The fees paid directly to the carrier however, (in most cases, their fees are not paid until your vehicle is delivered) are not directly controlled by us, so any requests for a refund of the carrier's portion would need to be addressed with the carrier directly.

Of course! And you are always backed by our Damage Free Guarantee policy.

Part of what you pay us for is to verify that the car carrier that we put you on is covered by the proper amount of insurance and that everything is up to date.

There is never any additional cost to you for this coverage, and their insurance is always primary.

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