How An Insurance Company Determines Your Premiums

Do you know your insurance score? Most people don't
even realize that they have one until they receive an
"adverse-action" notice in the mail notifying them that,
based on their insurance score, they don't qualify for the
lowest pricing available from their insurance provider.
To help you decipher what all this means, here we go
over what the insurance score is, how it's calculated and
some things you can do to improve it.
Tutorial: Introduction To Insurance
The Mystery
If you ever get one of these adverse-action letters, any
efforts to dig a little deeper into the circumstances
behind your low score requires more perseverance than
most people are willing to put forth.
The adventure begins by following the letter's
instructions to call the listed 1-800 number to receive a
free copy of your credit report - which apparently has
some effect on the score. You may wait several weeks
for a reply, only to be sent a consent form that reads like
an 's dream: the form will request detailed proof of
identification, including photocopies of your driver's
license, in addition to your social security number and
your insurance information.
If after gathering all of that information you are brave
enough to send it off through the mail, the packet that
you get back will simply summarize your credit rating,
with absolutely no information about your insurance
score. If you inquire further with the credit-reporting
agency , you will likely be told that your credit report
contains information that was used to calculate your
insurance score, but that the credit-reporting agency has
no access to your actual score.
If you persist and contact your insurance company, it
will likely tell you that 99% of its clients do not qualify
for the company's lowest rate, and to qualify, your credit
must be absolutely perfect. In other words, even if you
carry no balances on your credit cards, own your home
free and clear, are completely debt free and have a credit
rating in the high 700s, you're still unlikely to have an
insurance score that qualifies you for the lowest
available insurance rate. So what exactly is this
mysterious insurance score, and what exactly is its
reason and purpose?
What It Is and How It Is Calculated
An insurance score is a rating used to predict the
likelihood that a customer will file an insurance claim.
This score - as we noted above - is based on an
analysis of a consumer's credit rating, and the method
for calculating it varies from insurer to insurer. While
many companies use proprietary formulas to calculate
the scores, the factors used in the calculation include the
customer's outstanding debt, length of credit history,
payment history, amount of revolving credit versus
amount of credit in the form of loans, available credit
and monthly account balance.
Unlike a credit rating, which uses personal financial
information to determine your ability to repay debts,
insurance-score calculations do not factor in your
income. This omission means that it is very possible for
you to be penalized for taking out a large loan or
charging a large amount on your credit cards each
month even if your income is more than enough to cover
the expenses.
The Logic
Insurance companies justify the use of insurance scores
by citing studies that apparently show a positive
correlation between credit scores and insurance claims.
At some level, this may seem to make sense. At the level
of minor traffic accidents, for example, it is reasonable to
argue that individuals with poor credit are more likely to
file claims, if for no other reason than the fact that they
lack the funds to make repairs on their own.
Of course, if we look at the logic behind insurance scores
we might want to look at it also from a business
perspective: insurance scoring is quite profitable,
especially since almost nobody qualifies for the lowest-
tier pricing. Keep in mind that insurance premiums are a
recurring revenue stream for insurance companies, and
the scores help justify higher premiums.
How to Minimize the Impact on Your Wallet
A perfect insurance score, in the eyes of an insurance
company, represents a client with the lowest possible
risk of filing a claim, so - since the probability of filing a
claim is based on credit - good credit is the key to a
high score. A good credit report can have such a large
impact on your insurance premium that you can, for
example, have a flawed driving record but good credit
and pay less for your car insurance than a driver who
has a perfect driving record but bad credit. Do keep in
mind, however, that your insurance score is not the only
factor that determines your premium (you can ask your
insurer for more details on what the other factors are).
While it is unlikely that your insurance score will ever be
perfect, there are a few relatively painless steps that you
can take to improve your score. To keep your insurance
score high, be sure to pay all of your bills on time and
limit the number of credit cards that you apply for and
open. (See The Importance Of Your Credit Rating and
Consumer Credit Report: What's On It.)
But, paying your bills on time isn't enough: as we
mentioned above your insurance score is adversely
impacted by large monthly credit card expenditures,
even if you pay off your entire balance each month. To
help your insurance score, you can minimize your credit
card use. While it can prove unreasonably inconvenient
to stop using your credit card entirely, most of us can
find ways to cut down.
That said, if your goal is to have a perfect insurance
score, be sure to evaluate whether the costs of changing
your financial spending patterns is worth it. Cutting out
your use of credit cards means time-consuming trips to
the ATM and extra service charges from increased debit
card use. You might also have to avoid the convenience
of online transactions (still done primarily through the
credit card), and, finally, if your credit card company
offers you benefits - such as air-travel or other types of
points - you might have to forgo these as well.
So, even after finding out about an imperfect insurance
score, you may find the effort needed to perfect it is not
worth what may amount to relatively small savings in
premiums. (Remember, your insurance score is not the
sole impact on your premium.)
The Insurance Score Is Here to Stay
The use of credit history to determine insurance
premiums is quite alarming to many consumers,
particularly to those who have never filed an insurance
claim but still don't qualify for the lowest available
pricing. Unfortunately, insurance scoring is a standard
practice among the ranks of the nation's largest
insurers. Erie Insurance, in its explanation of insurance
scoring on its website , reports that 90% of insurers use
insurance scoring in some way. Other studies place that
percentage even higher. With that in mind, the best way
to help keep your insurance premium low is to keep your
credit score high. Take the same amount of caution with
your credit score as you would with your driving - being
responsible with both can save you serious amounts of
money in insurance premiums.