Question
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Followup To
Question -
I was driving my girlfriends car, on which I am not covered, and rear-ended another car that was stopped to make a left turn. She carried full coverage through safe-auto on the car. I have full coverage on my car through State Farm on my dads policy. I live with my girlfriend. We have filed a claim with both companies and both refuse to pay anything. Safe Auto said no because I live with my girlfriend and State Farm said no because I do not live with my dad. Do I have any ground to stand on here? They have also suspended my license for driving without insurance because niether company has paid for damages.
Answer -
This one will require some more info.
What state do you live in?
I live in Ohio.
AnswerWow this is quite a mess.
The strongest case for denial comes from your girlfriend's carrier. If you were not a listed driver and are sharing the household, then that one is hard to fight.
However, I believe that State Farm's denial is on a little shakier ground. It's hard to say for sure without knowing every little detail, but the strength of their denial will depend on how long you've been living away from home, what rate difference would apply, etc. In my state, this could likely be handled as a denial only if the company were willing to cancel the policy back to the original date of inception which would also include a full refund of every premium dollar paid. If they are willing to do this over a garaging issue, then they may have a good case. However, I'm guessing that is not what they are doing. What we would normally do with such a claim is to pay it and then have underwriting bill the insured for any rate differences owed.
At this point, I would definitely get your state's insurance commissioner's office to review the claim. In fact, you may even have grounds for a bad faith suit, depending on the specific issues.
Good luck on this. I'd appreciate your feedback and would really like to know the outcome.
