Any insurance guys out there?

I recently blew out the lower unit on my motor. It turns out that the insurance company has agreed to cover the damage. One problem, they claim the repairs are more than what the motor is worth. They said they would pay out a certain sum of money to me for the “total loss value” of the motor minus the deductible. The only thing is that the value they are coming up with is way lower than what I can find anywhere around town. If I take their offer I will have to come up with at least another $1000 to purchase a similar motor.

So the question is, how do they come up with their “total loss value”. It just doesn’t seem right. If it’s a total loss, you would think the sum they would pay out would be enough to buy the same motor in the local market.

Any help or insight would be great.

Thanks.

Im not real up to date on my insurance stuff, BUT I know Justin Schneider from here on the site will be able to help ya out. Hopefully he will chime in soon

Hi Karl,

If a boat is over 5 years old, most insurance companies cover your boat as actual cash value. What this means in your case is that since the motor appears to be totaled, the company will only give you what the motor would be worth today, minus your policy deductible.

Unfortunately, some insurance companies have a different process of determining how much a motor is worth in the event of a total loss. Since I do not know which company your are currently insured with, It hard for me to speculate which valuation process they may use.

What I would do is provide your insurance company with some examples of similar outboards in your area, and the purchase price of them. Most companies will reconsider their original claim payout in the event they are too low, provided you can support your claim.

I will contact the claims adjuster for Angler’s Advantage for you tomorrow morning and get you a concrete answer as to how this problem would be handled under their company guidelines as well.

In the mean time, if you have any questions, feel free to give me a call.

Justin’s answer is correct

Most assets age and depreciate. Insurance would be even more painfully expensive if insurance companies agreed to cover “replacement cost” not to mention the moral hazard of people destroying their equipment so that they could get new at the insurance companies expense.

The claims process usually leaves policy holders scratching their heads and is really a time for your agent to help you.

Scott

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The claims process usually leaves policy holders scratching their heads and is really a time for your agent to help you.

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Exactly, and if he won’t help you (within reason), it’s time to look for a new insurance company…AND agent.

The policy I have through Justin with Angler’s Advantage is a replacement cost insurance policy. And it was less expensive than the “agreed value” policy I had prior. I made the switch because I didn’t want to get hit with a huge bill to replace equipment because my insurance company felt those items had depreciated since the time the policy was put in place. If I hit a reef and rip the lower unit off my yamaha I want a new lower unit…. not 70% of cost to replace.

Insurance is only as good as the fine print. I would urge everyone to take the time to talk openly with their agents about their policy and how claims will be handled following an accident. Talk through specific claim scenarios that you might be most likely to run into. If you don’t like the answers you get, Justin has been awesome to work with. I would recommend him without hesitation to anyone looking to upgrade their insurance AND save some money in the process.

I agree with other posts. Get used values on similar motors and present that to your agent. Sometimes it pays to negotiate. I know we have done this for our customers in the past.

I took your advice and called around town for prices, turns out the range that I came up with was $2,200 – $2800 to buy the same year & hp motor that I have. The insurance company had the value right around $1,000. Wow, what a difference. I called up the claims adjuster and told her what I found, faxed a written quote and wouldn’t you know, they are sending a check to cover the full repairs! They changed their stance on the damage, instead of being a total loss, it’s now repairable.

This is a good lesson for anyone dealing with insurance companies. My claim started out being rejected, then partially covered to finally being fully covered. It was initially rejected because they claimed damage was “mechanical”. I decided to do a little homework and requested the appraisers report on my motor. His comments/remarks were at the bottom of the page and clearly said “damage was caused from multiple impacts”. After getting this info I had to call the claims adjuster and say, hey this guy says that it’s from impact. She then told me “oh, well I guess we would cover it then”!!! Then they give me this bs with the valuation of the motor. In the end, the motor gets fixed and I can fish again.

So long story short, just because you have a claim that gets rejected, don’t give up on it if you believe they should cover. Ask plenty of questions & request copies of reports that were filed and don’t take their bs.

This such a great example of why you stick with an honest insurance company when you can find one and don’t hop around just looking for the lowest rate.

Thanks again for all the help.