Did you know that ERIE provides insurance to rent a car if your regular car lands in the shop for a while?
The endorsement is known as Transportation Expenses, and it provides coverage for a rental car while your regular car is being repaired as the result of a covered loss.
This coverage applies to two types of auto claims: collision claims (which result from physical damage to your vehicle caused by rolling over or hitting another vehicle or object) and comprehensive claims (resulting from something other than collision, such as fire, theft or vandalism). Both collision coverage and comprehensive coverage are optional coverages you can choose to add to your policy.
If you choose to purchase optional comprehensive coverage for your car, ERIE automatically provides basic rental car coverage after a comprehensive claim. (In North Carolina, this applies to vehicle theft claims only.)
Things are different with a collision claim. If you choose to purchase optional collision coverage for your car, you’ll need to add Transportation Expenses in order to have rental car coverage after a covered loss. (The only exception is Virginia, where state regulations mandate basic coverage at no additional cost.)
Transportation Expenses coverage for collision claims can save you sizeable out-of-pocket costs. It’s affordable, too, with coverage for one vehicle starting at just $8 a year.
No surprises at the rental counter
Most insurance companies offer insurance to rent a car in the form of a daily dollar limit toward a rental car. (Virginia has aggregate per loss instead of a daily limit). This often leads to guess work on your part about what kind of vehicle you can get for a given daily limit. Even if you think you chose the right limit, there’s no guarantee it will be enough to cover the vehicle you really want—or need.
ERIE decided to take a different, more intuitive approach.* Instead of a daily limit, you select a class of vehicle you want. There are five classes from which to choose:
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Class 1: Compact sedan
Class 2: Traditional sedan
Class 3: Small SUV or pickup truck
Class 4: Minivan or midsize SUV
Class 5: Luxury sedan or large SUV
“Not everyone knows what $35 a day will rent, but everyone knows what a minivan is,” says Cody Cook, a vice president and product manager at ERIE and dad who chose Class 4 to accommodate his family of six. “By having to choose a class instead of a daily limit, you know you have the right coverage before you need to use it.”
Interested in learning more about insurance to rent a car after an accident? Then make sure to contact an Erie Insurance Agent in your community.
*Due to state requirements, ERIE maintains dollar limits for for Transportation Expense coverage in North Carolina and Virginia.
Read the full story from Erie Insurance: “Insurance to Rent a Car After an Accident“
