The whole purpose of obtaining auto insurance is to protect the driver and the rest of the passengers and the family members in the vehicle in the event of an accident and if anyone sustains grievous injuries.
Auto accidents in the year 2009, caused a loss of $2.55 dollars in Wisconsin. During that time at least 41,589 people suffered injuries and 532 people got killed. There were 79,596 crashes that resulted in property damage as per the statistics provided by the Wisconsin Department of Transportation. The economic losses in Wausau alone amounted to around $19.1 million.
The two most important auto insurance covers for family members in the event of an accident are the underinsured motorist coverage and the uninsured motorist coverage. These two covers will offer protection to you in case there is a negligent driver who doesn’t have insurance cover or doesn’t have enough cover to pay for medical costs for you or your family members. These insurance covers are so special because of the fact that they offer you and your family members the protection irrespective of who is driving or who is a passenger or a biker or a pedestrian.
To put it in other words, these covers will offer you and your family enough protection wherever you go.
A law was recently signed by Gov. Scott Walker and this may substantially reduce the benefits that you have currently. As per the new law, the insurance companies can now put the ‘reducing clauses’ as well as the ‘anti-stacking’ provisions in their insurance contracts.
As per a story that was carried out in the Wausau Daily Herald, there are indications the underinsured coverage would be made mandatory. But this is far from the truth. Now, insurance agents are required to just ‘offer’ the uninsured motorist coverage to all their customers. Now motorists are not required to have it, although it provides the much needed protection.
This legislation has been termed ‘consumer friendly’ by the governor. But the truth is that it is the most anti-consumer auto insurance legislation and nothing like this has been passed since decades, in Wisconsin. The more regressive provisions of the legislation include:
- Insurance companies can provide less coverage than what you actually pay for as they can now add reducing clauses to the under-insured motorist coverage.
- Under-insured motorist coverage will now be redefined in a narrow way which would put limits on the claims for the seriously injured.
