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We always think that we will never have to file a comprehensive coverage claim, but accidents happens. If you need to file a claim at some point in time, and you expect your car insurer gives you the reason and, of course, give you a fair amount of money to repair for vehicle. 

Bring all the pictures, videos, the police record,and a quotation of the repair costs of your car to make a strong case for your dispute


Unfortunately, in the real world, car insurance disputes can be a real pain, leaving you feeling frustrated and unsure of what to do. In this article, we'll explore how to handle disputes with your comprehensive insurance provider.

Understanding Comprehensive Insurance

Before we delve into the topic of disputes with your comprehensive insurance provider, you must have a basic understanding of what comprehensive insurance is and how it works. Comprehensive insurance is coverage option that will protect your car against non-collision damages like theft, vandalism, and damage caused by natural disasters like hurricanes or floods, among others.

I wrote an article explaining about this:

How Does Comprehensive Car Insurance Work?

Common Reasons for Disputes with Insurance Providers

Your car insurer will try to save money, it’s normal, they’re a company that look for benefits, even if their job is protect the possible risks of your vehicle while you’re driving, they will also try to reduce expenses, and those expenses are the claims.

Your car insurer will use many reasons to pay you less or even nothing. Let’s talk about the reasons you would dispute your car insurer’s decision:

  • One of the most common is the cause you suffer that acciddent or extent of damage to your vehicle.

  • Another common reason to dispute it’s the actual cash value of your vehicle before you suffer that accident. Trying to lower the amount of money they have to pay you, so you will know the amount of money they offer you is just 1/3 of wha you will have to pay to repair your car.

  • The last reason why you may dispute with your car insurer is the time they take to process a claim, that’s a common trick to make you pick their first check they offer you.

Steps to Take When Disputes Arise

When a dispute arises with your insurance provider, you must follow the next steps:

Gather Evidence

The first step when handling a dispute against your car insurer is to gather evidence to support your claim. Take photos of any damage to your vehicle and obtain any relevant police reports or witness statements.

In addition, talk to a trustfull mechanic who would tell you the right amount of money you will need to repair your car. This way you will be able to provide your car insurer a compelling situation of what you will really have to pay in the body shop.

Understand Your Policy

Make sure you understand the terms in the declaration page of your policy and what is covered. Your car insurer bounds by the terms of your policy (they can’t say they won’t cover something that your policy covers).

That’s the reason why you must know how to interpret your policy, as you know, your comprehensive insurance will cover water damage, but it may not cover water damage from a broken water pipe. So you should find a way to make your dispute make sense for your car insurer.

Communicate with Your Insurance Provider

If you have a dispute with your insurance provider, the first step is do not sign nothing they give you, the main reason why is if you sign it, you will accept their terms, so you won’t be able to fight them in the court (but that’s on last resort).

You must be calm and explain them with pictures, your trusted mechanic’s quotation, and the police record why their settlement is wrong.

You don’t want to look like you’re mad at them, remember, humans are reciprocal animals, if someone who is mad at you approaches at your home shouting and insulting at you, would you open the door? No, that’s why you must remain calm.

Consider Mediation

When you read your car insurer’s reasons why their settlement has been set like that, and after you explain your car insurer why are they wrong. Your car insurer will remain saying their car adjuster did an accurate job, so you can always hire an adjuster who will valuate the accident, and how much your car insurer will have to pay you.

Your adjuster will argue with your car insurer’s adjuster about the real repair costs of your vehicle, if both adjusters can’t reach an agreemtn, you should consieder mediation. Mediation is just a neutral 3rd-party person or company that would decide the actual cash value of your car and/or your repair costs. That person’s cost-effective is really worth, because you won’t need go court to handle this situation, saving you more money.

Seek Legal Advice

If all else fails, you may need to seek legal advice. An attorney who is specialized in car insurance, would help you. You can ask them some questions about your case, and if that lawyer thinks you have a real case that would win on the court, you should hire him/her.

However, that only happens in a perfect world. Here in real life, you can hire an attorney who would help you handle this, but if that attorney feels like his or her effort won’t be worth the time, s/he will tell you accept your car insurer’s settlement.

I don’t say all lawyers will do that, some of them will really help you handling this for a portion of what you will receive from your car insurer, but that extra amount of money you will receive won’t really cover hiring a lawsuit expenses (or not, everything depends on the severity of the accident, and if you had injuries or not).

Conclusion

Disputes with your comprehensive insurance provider can be frustrating and time-consuming. However, if you follow all these steps, just taking pictures, the police record, and the real repair costs of your vehicle form a trusted mechanic, you will have a solid base to win the dispute against your car insurer.

Don’t forget to read the declaration page of your policy, that will help you understand what your comprehensive insurance covers and what not. In case your car insurer’s adjuster keeps telling you s/he did an accurate pricing for the repair costs of your vehicle, you can always hire another adjuster to argue the real price for you. In case they both can’t reach an agreement, you can hire a neutral 3rd party who will mediate between them.

If anything of this works, you can finally hire an attorney, explain your case, and if s/he thinks it’s a winning case, s/he will fight it in the court.

Other readers were also interested in the following posts:

Understanding Comprehensive Coverage Car Insurance Limits

What can I do when my car insurance company denies my claim?

How can I know if my Insurance adjuster is doing a good job?

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