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Ieuter Insurance Group Blog

All You Ever Wanted to Know About Insurance

The Accident Wasn't My Fault, so Why Are My Rates Going Up?

This is a great question and one that has become more common in the last 3 years.  Insurance companies completely changed the way they rate policies over the last decade.  They use a complex formula that they refer to as “predictive modeling.”  This model is a way for them to fine tune their rates and charge insureds more appropriately. 

Essentially what this does is assign a factor for everything from tickets to credit scores to accidents to determine a rate.  Years ago, accidents like deer car claims or being hit in a parking lot were considered not at fault accidents and they didn’t affect your rates.  Well, now insurance actuaries have determined that even NOT at fault accidents should affect your rates according to their statistics. 

Why?  Well, their studies show that people who have had one or more NOT at fault accidents in a 5 year time frame are statistically more likely to have an at fault accident in the near future.   Before you get alarmed, the factor for NOT at fault accidents is not that significant unless you have multiple ones within a 5 year period.