My insurance company has a hybrid vehicle discount

The purpose of which is to encourage environmentally friendly driving. I just called today and my Leaf doesn't qualify because it's not a hybrid. :roll:

Tell them your spare tire is from an Altima, maybe then it would qualify.

With the logic they're using, that just might work.

Maybe, inquire up the chain of command? If they're willing to do it for hybrids, maybe they just don't understand BEVs yet. If it works, you could be helping out a lot of other drivers. Good luck.

My Volt does with Travelers but not my Leaf.

Ian B

In Canada my insurance company has what they call a green car discount which applied to my Leaf. I didn't know anything about it and got a letter about a month after i got the Leaf with and explanation and my new lower rate. Nice little bonus worked out to about 10 dollars a month cheaper.

That's 4 year old mentality, and takes me back to when I was shopping a car loan for the LEAF - discounted rate for loans on hybrids from my CU, zilch for EVs.

No discount for me either at USAA.. In fact my Leaf is the most expensive car on my policy. Even more than my Chrysler 300 SRT-8 with 500hp and a 173mph top speed, and that one has always had me scratching my head. For grins my Leaf is $71 per month and the above mentioned 300 is $58 per month. Everytime my policy renews I bring it up and they just tell me the rates are what they are and they have no explanation. I will wind up asking again when my policy is due for renewal in a few months, and sure the answer will still be no.

$71 a month? Not bad. I'm being charged $114 a month, no multi car discount for me.

Roadburner440 said:

No discount for me either at USAA.. In fact my Leaf is the most expensive car on my policy. Even more than my Chrysler 300 SRT-8 with 500hp and a 173mph top speed, and that one has always had me scratching my head. For grins my Leaf is $71 per month and the above mentioned 300 is $58 per month. Everytime my policy renews I bring it up and they just tell me the rates are what they are and they have no explanation. I will wind up asking again when my policy is due for renewal in a few months, and sure the answer will still be no.

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USAA is a special case. Think of it more as a group self-insurance policy; meaning that they try and balance costs across everyone based on actual claim risk... Keep in mind we get a rebate periodically when they have a surplus of collections (i.e. claims over all lower than expected). I don't believe that USAA is into social engineering (i.e. encouraging green vehicles etc). Frankly I'm happy with this as I purchase car insurance to manage my risk, not to subsidize someone's social agenda (other than safe driving that of course reduces the risks that I'm sure).

Roadburner440 said:

No discount for me either at USAA.. In fact my Leaf is the most expensive car on my policy. Even more than my Chrysler 300 SRT-8 with 500hp and a 173mph top speed, and that one has always had me scratching my head. For grins my Leaf is $71 per month and the above mentioned 300 is $58 per month. Everytime my policy renews I bring it up and they just tell me the rates are what they are and they have no explanation. I will wind up asking again when my policy is due for renewal in a few months, and sure the answer will still be no.

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My guess is they are going with unknown repair costs for the BEV bits of the car. This should have changed since Nissan announced the battery replacement cost but then again they may also be going with high risk of a full loss in a relatively minor accident due to lack of replacement used/aftermarket parts and high labour rates due to limited knowledge/experience of repair procedures. Another guess would be someone assessing the risk still thinks there's a greater chance of a BEV catching fire.

In Ontario we have some of the highest insurance in North America, and to make it worse I'm in one of the higher rate areas. I'm paying $114 a month for my leaf and that's a deal with the green car discount. I was with state farm and when I got my insight I didn't price it out because it was a cheap used car. They wanted $170 a month just for liability coverage!!!! I'm guessing a lack of collision data was the reason. I could have driven a Mercedes GL 7 seater for $135 a month.

It also hurts that they think of this as a $30K car, not a $23K car. Owners get a tax credit which makes the effective purchase price lower, but not the insured value. Same applies to registration fees in my state, which are based on MSRP.

Bob

Bob said:

It also hurts that they think of this as a $30K car, not a $23K car. Owners get a tax credit which makes the effective purchase price lower, but not the insured value. Same applies to registration fees in my state, which are based on MSRP.

Bob

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Hmm - well, if you are buying insurance based on replacement cost what is that cost? Can we assume that the $7500 is available to the insured when/if it has to be replaced? I don't think so (not everyone has same tax situation etc, even if tax code allows you to get it more than once).

That doesn't really make sense either. My Chrysler is a $57,000 car, and would cost just as much to replace it. That was my point. Not only is it far more expensive, far faster, and far more of a risk in every category. Yet my EV that has a 94mph top speed, and can't take outside of a 30-35 mile circle from my house is more expensive. Repair costs might be greater, but I am not really certain. It seems the ones that do get wrecked are usually totaled, and that might drive up the cost. Certainly leaves one scratching their heads how they come up with the numbers. All the other quotes that I have gotten from Progressive, Geico, and others have been even more expensive than I currently pay. So is not just my insurance co that places the Leaf in a high risk category it seems.

Roadburner440 said:

... Repair costs might be greater, but I am not really certain. ...

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I think the repair costs are pretty high.
There is a thread about rear end accident that cost $18,000 to repair on a 2014.
See http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=27&t=17596&hilit=+repair#p382227" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

Roadburner440 said:

That doesn't really make sense either. My Chrysler is a $57,000 car, and would cost just as much to replace it. That was my point. Not only is it far more expensive, far faster, and far more of a risk in every category. Yet my EV that has a 94mph top speed, and can't take outside of a 30-35 mile circle from my house is more expensive. Repair costs might be greater, but I am not really certain. It seems the ones that do get wrecked are usually totaled, and that might drive up the cost. Certainly leaves one scratching their heads how they come up with the numbers. All the other quotes that I have gotten from Progressive, Geico, and others have been even more expensive than I currently pay. So is not just my insurance co that places the Leaf in a high risk category it seems.

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But your Chrysler is also one of the most popular cars around. Because of that if it's in an accident there are multiple sources of parts used, new oem and new aftermarket. Many of the parts are shared with a $25,000 car so repair cost isn't always in line with purchase price. There's tons of them on the used market they can accurately reflect the replacement value a year from now. There's enough data that they can say X % of accidents cost under $Y to fix. The thing with the leaf is it's unknown because it's exotic, new and up until recently pretty rare.

The companies that have been offering discounts on hybrids/BEVs (as mine states in the info I but now can't find) have been saying that after looking back at the data for hybrids they found that they were involved in less collisions, this has allowed them to offer a discount based on the reduced likelihood to be involved in an accident. The flip side to that is reduced data to predict accident repair costs. When the stats guys punch the numbers the amount of BEVs out there is still pretty small. When you apply logic to the stats of how a BEV operates and the type of driver it attracts it supports that notion but for a number cruncher in an insurance company without knowledge there may not be enough data yet to prove it.

There's only 1 thing that an insurance company hates more than high risk, that's unknown risk.

The Hartford (AARP) is another insurance company that has offered a hybrid discount for years, but has so far been unable/unwilling to come out with an EV discount.

As far as Allstate goes, early on my '12 LEAF wasn't bad to insure at each 6 month interval but most recently it went up 30% since last June for my December 'annual' renewal --- called my agent to see what gives and now that Allstate has more of a bank of info on repair costs; its raised the premiums a LOT to compensate. We've got 3 drivers and 4 cars and have been a long term accident-free customer so I negotiated some other ways to get the whole thing down a bit but still; so much for saving the planet! --- it's going to cost you. I would have thought a hybrid (especially a PHEV) would be more to 'fix' overall than a pure EV due to the additional components, etc. but insurance companies I'm sure are simply looking at the claim side.

On another note; over on the Fiat forum, someone had a smallish dent on the underside of their Fiat 500e (from going through a 'mudslide' no less) and it looks like its 'totaled' it as replacing the battery would cost $35K … insurance rates indeed! Yet another aspect on these 'compliance' EV's; had heard several stories that Fiat was losing a lot on each EV it sells so this actually does make some sense versus Nissan's much lower cost on battery replacements.

http://www.fiat500usaforum.com/showthread.php?19306-Fiat-500e-damaged-battery-16k!

Next CARB initiative, forget purchase rebates, now with insurance rebates to really save you money!!!!