How a motorcycle skid accident is handled depends on the severity of the skid and the presence of any injuries.

Any accidents that  involve a motorcycle have to be handled with care as these types of accidents have a higher likelihood of an injury. For a motorcycle skid accident with no injuries, what to do next depends on the seriousness of the accident.

If the accident is minor, for example the motorcycle in front of you stops suddenly and you hit their back tire sending them into a skid at a low speed.  Exchange insurance information and go your own way, if both vehicles are drivable.  You are going to want to report this to your insurance company so that they can have a claim started for when the motorcyclist or their insurance turns in a claim to them, because unless the motorcycle rider pulled out in front of you; you are at fault for following to close (depending on your state laws).

If the vehicle is more serious and additional assistance is needed to clean up fuel or tow a vehicle away, call the authorities for assistance and file a police report.  Having a police report filed for a low speed accident is also a good idea, but unless the area you live in requires on to be filed, may not be necessary.

Nationwide’s Vanishing Deductible program offers you a chance to pay less money out of your pocket at the time of a claim as a reward for previous good driving.

Nationwide's Vanishing Deductible decreases your deductible in exchange for good driving.

Every insurance company tries to offer a special program to draw new customers into their insurance family. It could be a discount for your expensive student if they keep up their grades or it could be a premium refund for every year you don’t file an insurance claim. In the case of Nationwide Insurance – it’s their Vanishing Deductible program.

The information that Nationwide offers on their website gives the basics of the program, but leaves one asking a lot of questions.

To get more information, I called the Nationwide’s Insurance Call Center at 877-669-6877 and the representative there was able to offer more of the details of the Nationwide Vanishing Deductible program.

What is Nationwide’s Vanishing Deductible?

Nationwide’s Vanishing Deductible program is a basically a safe driver reward program that will save you money on your deductible if you should ever have a claim. If you sign up for this particular Nationwide program and chose a $500 deductible with your coverage, they automatically knock $100 off of your deductible just for signing up; making your $500 deductible $400 from the start.

Then for each year that you are a safe driver and do not file a claim with Nationwide they will knock off an additional $100 (up to $500).

If you do have a claim you will only have to pay out of pocket what your current deductible is at the time of the accident.  For example, you choose a $500 deductible and you are a safe driver for 2 years and get 2 of the $100 deductible drops. If you have an accident your deductible will only be $200 for that accident ($500 starting deductible – $100 sign up bonus – $200 for two years of safe driving = $200 left of your vanishing deductible).

What Deductibles Does it Cover?

Nationwide’s Vanishing Deductible decreases all of your deductibles that you have on your policy, not just your collision coverage deductible. This means your comprehensive deductible, your uninsured/ underinsured motorist coverage and your collision deductible.

What if the Accident is not my Fault?

If you have an accident that is not your fault, then you shouldn’t be penalized for it under this program, right? The answer to that question is….sort of.

Per the call center employee, if Nationwide has to pay for the damages from the accident you can use the lowered deductible for this claim, but you start back to your full deductible again after the accident.

So if your deductible has been lowered to $300 from $500 through the Vanishing Deductible program, your deductible for this accident will be $300. But, then you go back to the $500 deductible after that and have to start working toward claim free years again to start getting it lowered back down.

The only exceptions to this is if the other party’s insurance pays for the damages to your vehicle, if you have a rock chip in your windshield that can be repaired without the windshield being replaced and if you total your vehicle. The last one is a bit tricky though.

If you total out your vehicle Nationwide will waive your full deductible for you with this claim, but your claim free period is erased and you start back over at your full deductible again.

Female drivers aged 16-19 lack the driving experience and sometimes maturity that is needed to be a good driver, leading these girl drivers to be a high insurance risk.

Girl drivers are not quite women yet and are a high insurance risk due to lack of experience driving.

Not quite women yet, but with a new driver’s license they are no longer children either. These girl drivers are still learning how to handle both life and driving at the same time.

Because still they are still learning, they make bad decisions and mistakes in driving situations that they are not familiar with and both lead to car accidents. Because of the higher chance of having an accident, these girl drivers face higher insurance premiums.

Ages 16-19

From the time that they get their license at age 16 until they turn 20 these girls are still learning how to handle dangerous driving situations that may happen quickly and that they are not experienced enough to react correctly to in order to avoid an accident. They are also still learning how to be responsible and can make bad decisions in judgment behind the wheel, which is why this age group pays the highest insurance rates of all females and is second only to the boy drivers of the same age group.

Insurance Rates for Girl Drivers

Insurance rates have always been cheaper for girls than they have been for boys of the same age group. The general rule of thinking has continued to be that girls are less of an insurance risk than boys are because they are seen as less aggressive and less likely to take chances while driving a vehicle.

These chances could be anything from passing another vehicle when it is clearly not safe to do so because they want to drive faster or doing things behind the wheel to impress others that they would not normally do when driving alone.

However, while boys continue to have the higher insurance rates, the girls are closing in. In recent years, insurance companies have seen more accidents and aggressive driving behavior in girls and have started to raise their rates accordingly. While they are still cheaper to insure than a boy, they may not be for much longer.

What Is Going On With Our Girl Drivers?

Is the increase in auto insurance claims and risky behavior behind the wheel something that we need to be worried about with these girls? Yes and No.

Yes, we need to be concerned because bad teen driving, no matter what the gender, has an effect on us all. It may be just minor damage to our property from a teen showing off that they can drive with no hands or it could be a loss of life because a teen driver didn’t want to follow behind a slower moving vehicle and passed them while in a no passing zone.

No, we shouldn’t be concerned because the increase of claims has a lot to do with more girls getting their drivers licenses than they have in the past and also the increased amount of time and miles that girls spend behind the wheel as compared to earlier generations. The more time behind the wheel means more chances for an accident and increases the statistics. It does not mean that our girl drivers are necessarily becoming worse drivers.

Having continuous car insurance on your vehicle will save you more money than you would if you were to cancel your current policy to save on the premium.

Continuous car insurance works best for you financially if you never stop it.

Even when times are tough financially, dropping your car insurance is one of the worst things that you could possibly do to save yourself money. Car insurance, at least liability insurance, is required to be in place if you are going to drive your vehicle.

If you are caught without having insurance on your vehicle, not only will you be paying for a ticket, you will now be paying more for your insurance than you did before cancelling your policy. In the end you will not have saved yourself much money at all by cancelling your insurance and not keeping continuous car insurance.

High Risk Insurance for Those Without Continuous Car Insurance

If you are caught by a police officer or you have an accident and you have no continuous car insurance in place, you are both legally and financially in trouble. Setting aside the fact that you will have to pay the ticket for not having insurance coverage, any money that you thought that you would save by cancelling your policy won’t even be close to what you will now have to pay out of your own pocket.

First, if you get into an accident with no insurance and it is your fault, you are personally responsible for paying for the damages and medical bills for the other party. This can either happen with you being taken to small claims court by the other party or through subrogation through the other party’s insurance company. Subrogation is when the insurance company goes after the responsible party of a car accident to get back the money that they paid out for their insured’s damages and even their insured’s deductible.

On top of all that, you will then most likely have to carry SR-22 insurance which adds a surcharge on your now new insurance policy that you went out and got after the incident. Thought we were done there? Not even close. You will also be placed in high risk insurance which is significantly more expensive than in the standard market that you cancelled your continuous car insurance from in the first place.

The State of California Requires Continuous Car Insurance

If you live in the state of California, the state tracks your insurance coverage through a database that all insurance companies that sell in that state have to report to. If you fail to keep continuous insurance on your vehicle you are required to stop driving the vehicle and report that it is no being driven. If you do not keep continuous car insurance or at least replace your continuous car insurance with a new insurance policy within 45 days, the state will suspend your vehicle registration and you will face financial penalties.

If you don’t live in California, your state is not far behind – if not already there.

Lose Longevity Discount

One of the discounts that people can take advantage of to lower their insurance premium is a longevity discount. This discount is basically a reward to you for keeping continuous insurance with the same company. If you cancel your continuous car insurance you will lose this discount even if you return to the same company at a later time.

Collision insurance is there to protect you from having to pay for damages that may happen to your vehicle, but it is not required to be able to drive and may not be needed in some cases.

If you stop paying your collision coverage, at-fault damage like this will not be covered.

Unlike liability coverage, collision insurance is not required to be in place for you to be able to drive. There are situations that you have to carry collision insurance on your vehicle, but this is not something that is required by your state government.

For those situations that you do not have to have it on your vehicle and you are looking to save some money in your budget this may be when to stop paying collision insurance on your car.

Stop Paying Collision Insurnace if You Can’t Afford It

Some people live on a very tight budget and have to cut corners where ever they can. If you need to cut some expenses, dropping your collision insurance from your insurance policy will save you money and you will still be able to drive your vehicle. However, you have to weigh the good with the bad in this situation.

Dropping collision insurance will do you good in saving you money, but you may be in a bad place financially if you cannot afford to fix any damages to your car from out of your own pocket. Because you dropped your collision insurance, your insurance company is no longer going to be stepping in to pay for the cost of damages above and beyond your deductible.

Stop Paying Collision Insurance With No Lienholder

The one situation in which you will be required to carry collision insurance on your vehicle is if you have a lienholder on it. A lienholder is the business that gave you the money to buy your vehicle and who you are now making monthly car payments to. They require that you carry collision insurance on your vehicle because until you pay off your car loan, the vehicle actually belongs to them and they want to make sure that it is protected from damages.

Once you have paid off your car loan and your lienholder sends you the title of the car, you are no longer required to carry collision insurance on this vehicle. If you wish to remove this coverage to save money on your premium you are now free to do so.

Stop Paying Collision Insurance when Your Vehicle is Old

If your vehicle is in pretty bad shape or it is just old, it may not be worth your money to even worry about putting collision insurance on it. If you were to get into an accident and the vehicle is a total loss, the insurance company is only going to pay up to a certain percentage of the vehicles worth.

If you have paid out more in insurance premium for the collision insurance than what the insurance company is going to pay out, you are better off just putting that money in a bank account and paying for any damages yourself. At least with having the money that you would have paid for collision insurance with in a bank account you can earn some interest off of the money.