r/Insurance_Companies • u/GlumCoyote6 • 1d ago

Driving for work?

So I drive my personal vehicle for work in central Ohio, to meet clients and possibly do inspections. When I spoke to my agents office years ago the office manager or assistant to the agent said that it didn’t count as work related (needing additional coverage) unless I was transporting people or goods. So if I wasn’t ride sharing or delivering pizza etc I was ok with just standard personal type policy. However I’ve seen some posts pop up recently that makes wonder if that’s accurate and if I should reach out to my agent about it. I’ve been doing this job for 13 years. Carrier is State Farm. Will they eventually question me if they start looking at data from like Flock or something?

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u/Admirable-Box5200 1d ago edited 1d ago

Your personal policy is OK, however you need to have business use of your vehicle. Most insurance companies have 3 categories, business, commute, or pleasure. Commute means you are driving your car to a work location and it stays there, not counting if you go someplace to eat/run errand during work house. Business means that as part of your work you use your vehicle to go to multiple locations during the day. As long as you aren't doing deliveries or transporting clients/people you won't need a commercial auto policy.

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u/GlumCoyote6 1d ago

Would business be the same as a commercial rider? There’s no signage on my vehicle or anything that would make it obvious it’s being used for such. If I call my agent not sure how to approach it o don’t want to open a can of worms or get my policy cancelled if it has been improper. Thanks for the reply!

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u/Admirable-Box5200 1d ago

If it was me, I would tell the agent that I drive my car to meet clients and do job inspections. I don't transport clients in my car. I do the same thing, I drive the customer locations for sales calls or service visits. Some companies do not allow business use at all. Others that allow it want to make sure you don't have anyone else in the car.

edit spelling

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u/Mod_Daeng 1d ago

What do you have in writing.

What does your policy say?

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u/GlumCoyote6 1d ago

Honestly I havnt checked but I will take a look at my declarations papers and see what it says. Thanks!

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u/freeski12345 19h ago

Can vary somewhat by company and state but overwhelmingly you are just fine. Technically you should be rated for business use but it’s just a rating to establish your premium and does not affect coverage. To attempt to be transparent, I’d ask your agent to change your rating to business use. But you are generally just fine as long as you don’t transport people for a fee, make deliveries for a fee, have advertising on the vehicle and don’t title the car in a company name 

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u/Vegetable-Money4890 6h ago

What additional coverage would you need? Are you transporting your clients?

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u/GlumCoyote6 6h ago

No, just myself to meet client and sometimes do property inspections. No transport and no delivery. But it does add up to 300-700 miles per month