'the cost of his car insurance jumped by 21 percent. Quotes from other insurance companies were also high. One insurance agent told him his LexisNexis report was a factor.
'LexisNexis sent him a 258-page “consumer disclosure report”
'more than 130 pages detailing each time he or his wife had driven the Bolt over the previous six months. It included the dates of 640 trips, their start and end times, the distance driven and an accounting of any speeding, hard braking or sharp accelerations.
‘the trip details had been provided by General Motors’
Then he should improve his driving skills, or cover the car in tinfoil! The buyer of the car signed the permission for OnStar to own the data they they are likely selling to LexisNexis to sell to insurance companies. Read before you sign!
What would concern me with a new car is the automatic enrollment in the trial period- free 3 months or something like that where you might not realize that you have defacto authorized the information sharing. I recall having some difficulty opting out of the Sirius trial period because I just wanted to transfer my existing subscription. SiriusXM was surprised by the request- why not have the free trial period and then do the switch over? Because my subscription is more comprehensive than your trial period and I don’t want to mess around…
If I’m lucky, it will be an early 1990’s economy car, with low mileage and in excellent condition. Every now and then, a well-preserved one is offered for sale, especially when an elderly person reaches the end of their driving life.
The problem with those cars – even though I concur w/you they have a preferable design – is everything on them is 30 years old. If these cars were still being made, you could buy one with all new parts. What a world that would be! But alas, such is not the case, nor will it ever be. I think my 92 Corolla (manual trans, wind up windows, no A/C) is pretty nearly perfectly configured (for me anyway) . The only thing I’d change is to switch from the fuel-injection system’s batch injection method used then, to sync’ing the injector pulses to the valve timing. I think that would improve the emissions a little.
I’ve been driving (if you can call it that; I checked my records today because I drove to the home store for lumber: I last bought gas last 2023 January 8.) this for 26 years, and it’s as good as the day I bought it. The compression is book. I’ve put in new water and fuel pumps. I’ve rebuilt the carburetor. The emissions are low enough to pass for a new car (not pickup, which has looser standards.) I bought new tires recently. I just bought a new battery. I attend to every paint failure promptly.
This last home renovation has taken it out of me though. I may not be driving anything in 10 years.
When I needed a new auxiliary acceleration pump a few years ago, I could get it only in a carburetor rebuild kit. AutoZone had it in stock. I’ve never had trouble buying parts. There were lots of carbs for sale too. I maintain it properly, drive it gently and rarely.
Look, the reality is that your agreement to let GM sell your driving data is buried deep in a torrent of words that MIGHT be printed out in a booklet that came with your new car, but you did not see that booklet before you bought the car and I doubt any dealer in the US has any idea how to get you a sample. If you start the car and by default turn on the GPS or On-Star or whatever else it’s called, you"accepted" the deal. It’s all just BS. Like your cell phone - Apple or Google knows where you are, where you go, how fast you drive, whose house you stop at. It’s a price you pay without thinking about it. You think CarTalk.com is free? Did you go to “Do Not Sell My Information” and turn it off?
Neither of my cars would be able to report anything to my insurance company if they wanted to. But I recently got an odd request from the insurance company asking me to send in the odometer readings on both. I’m not required to do this, only if I volunteer to send them the info. The insurance company has never asked about this until now. They’ve presumably had access to the Corolla’s odometer info via Cali Emissions Testing. But no emissions testing on the Corolla during the pandamic. I’m wondering if that is what this request is actually about? Just curious, have any of you folks received unusual requests for info from your car insurance companies recently?
Sometimes if you drive less, then you are at a lower risk of having an accident, therefor Ins might be cheaper… So you might be missing out on savings, or they could just be updating their records… Or it could have been Spam mail fishing for info, I would call your Ins agent and ask them what it is about… But to answer your question, no I have not gotten that email…
In the state of Arizona, your vehicle emissions testing history, which includes the odometer mileage, is a public record. Anyone who has the VIN can go to the website and view the complete history, going back as many years as the vehicle was registered in the state. So there would be no reason to try to hide this information from the insurance company.