Want To Save a Grand!

Last night at work I was playing on the Survivalpunk twitter account and saw a link to an article that looked interesting. The article was Saving mad money on car insurance! I’m a big fan of saving money so I greedily read this article. The article was short and sweet, very direct and full of tips. I’ve read this guys blog o occasion but after this I’m going to dig into it. I’m a cheap guy and I am working on becoming even cheaper. Let me share with you how I shaved $948 annually on my car insurance.

Asking for a Discount

I had been meaning to try to reduce my insurance for a while now and the above article gave me a much needed prodding. First up on the savings plan was to call my insurance company and ask for any discounts I could get. The first lady I talked to changed a setting that had changed when I dropped Bank of America for being Dicks and anti-2nd amendment. So she got the direct draft setting changed back and that “saved” me about fifty bucks. Which technically only took me back to my real starting point. Still too damn high at $200 a month. Before I could haggle harder my phone lost conection and I had to call back.

Using Threats

The next guy I talked to was an asshole. He went through a list of things to try to see if I qualified for any discounts. After a short questioneer I did not qualifying for any discounts at all. None not a signle one. So I told him that I would be spending the rest of the day shopping around to see what company would offer me a better deal if he couldn’t find a discount somewhere. . He told me that since I had a speeding ticket last year there was simply nothing he could do. I got kinda pissed at him and told him I would be changing companies before the day was over. Dick!

Shopping Around

Pissed at my company I fully decided I would find any place that offered me a cheaper deal. I was willing to swap companies for even a penny at this point. I tend to have a spiteful streak and my customer loyalty was on decline at this point. The first company for the same package offered me a price of $104 a month. Well shoot an almost hundred dollars cheaper is a darn good choice. I didn’t expect to find a cheaper deal than that.

Leverage

At this point I decided to give my current company one last chance. Well than and to see what my cancelation fees would be since my term doesn’t end for two more months. So I called back and asked about cancelation fees. This is where I finally heard some attempt to keep a customer. The nice and wonderful girl that helped, Amy, asked me the detials of the coverage I was leaving for. Which was the same, and even better in one area. For about $100 less.  She asked If I had already signed with them. I told her that I had not, I was one single click away from it though. I also mentioned in passing how I would love to stay with them if they could even come close to matching their price. As if by magic Amy was able to dig up a few discounts. Well I guess Mr. Dick didn’t try hard enough. She found a discount based on how many terms I had paid continuously with them. I figured being with them so long would be worth something. Next she did a credit check. Since my credit has vastly improved since I originally bought my car and got it insured it was another big discount.

Final Savings

After the final discounts were tallied up I ended up with an $120 a month bills. Over the previous $200 something bill I was happy. Sure I could have changed to the other company and possibly gotten a cheaper bill. Doing that though comes with much hassle. Including the quote may have been fudged. I would have had to cancel my current term early paying a fee. I would have had to have gotten some extra information and done lots of B.S. Saving $79 a bills and $984 annually is good enough.

Conclusion

If you’ve been putting it off like I had get off your ass and give your insurance company a call. I took me about an hour of phone talking and internet searching to get my savings. One hour to save almost one grand is a good return of investment if you ask me. I’m sorry it took me so long to finally do it. This of course is just one facet to my thriftiness.

What do you do to save a buck? Lemme know in the comments!

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