Auto Insurance Claims: claim denial, state insurance commissioners, denial letter

Question
Our teenage daughter took her mothers car keys and had an accident, totalling the car and injuring herself and others in our car and the other car. The insurance company is denying collision coverage for our car because she is "a resident and a relative and not listed on the Dec Page as a listed driver."  She has an instruction permit and when we questioned or agent we were told she is not required to be listed until she is age 18 OR licensed and had we known to add her prior to those stages she would have been covered at NO CHARGE for 6 months. The contact call from the claims specialist came 4 hours after the accident while we were still in the ER trauma room and the Denial letter was sent the day AFTER the accident with little or no investigation. Nobody from the insurance agency had looked at the police report OR seen the car.

We have collision insurance on the vehicle with a deductible and feel the car should still be covered.  Your thoughts??

Answer
Hi Gene,

You should call your insurance company and ask them to point out in your policy exactly where it states that your daughter needed to be added to the policy. Also you should contact your agent to ask them if they were aware of this and if they recall your asking about this. You may want to try to record the phone calls since there is likely nothing in writing that says that you inquired and what you were told. If you still feel that you shoudl have coverage, your next step would be to file a complaint with your state insurance commissioners office.

If you are unabe to find something in writing or get them on tape stating that you did inquire and what you were told and if the policy contract did require you to add your daughter, then there will likely be no coverage and nothing you can do.

I hope this helps
Richard Hixenbaugh