From convertible, to pickup trucks, The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety put vehicles to the test rating on how they do during font, side, and rear crashes.

One of thing that is important from this result is that the consumers are shopping for new vehicles that are safe and as well as transportation. Now the Institute is out with its list of the 2008 top safety pick.

There are more top safety picks this year, 34 versus 13 at the beginning of 2007. Basically, the automakers are making safer cars because the consumers are demanding more safer cars.

Top safest cars for 2008:

1. Ford Taurus
2. Mercury Sable
3. Volvo S80
4. Volvo C70
5. Ford edge
6. Ford Taurus X
7. Lincoln MKX
8. Volvo XC90
9. Honda Accord
10. Honda Odyssey
11. Accra MDX
12. Accra RDX
13. Honda pilot
14. Honda CR-V
15. Honda element

To be on the list of the top safest cars, the vehicle has to have good rating on the front, side, and rear impact crash test.

If you are looking for a safe SUV, The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety says the BMW X5 is one of the top pick. A midsized car is the Saab 9-3, in the minivan the Kia Sedona, and for the large pickup is the Toyota Tundra.

All of these cars have one thing in common, electronic stability control. It is a safety device that kicked in to keep cars from spinning out of control or roll over.

If you compare the real-world data for vehicles with or without electronic stability control. More than half are likely of a single vehicle fatal crash and an even larger reduction of crashes resulting from rollovers from 75% to 80%.

The institute says that one thing is for sure, it has seen major improvement in vehicle safety features.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety said that it would have added 23 more cars added to the safety list if the manufacturer had improved the seats and head restraints.

Comprehensive coverage applies for losses in fire, theft, vandalism, breaking glass, hitting an animal, hailstorm or flood damage or any other losses not caused by collision.

These coverage have deductible, the deductible is the amount you have to pay before your auto insurance company pays for the damages. The common cost for collision deductibles are about $500 or up to $1000. The comprehensive deductibles are $100 or $250.

If your automobile is finance, you are likely required by the bank or the financer to carry collision and comprehensive coverage until the loan is paid off.

It is important to note that an auto insurance company will never pay more to repair your vehicle than the vehicle is worth.

Two other coverage available through many auto insurance companies are towing/emergency roadside service coverage and the other is rental car reimbursement coverage.

While these coverage are optional, it is always recommended to have both coverage.

This year there were some big winners and some surprising losers. To come up with 2010 safest cars, the Insurance Institute employed font, side, rear and for the first-time rollover crash tests. Each year in the US there are about 25,000 to 35,000 people who die in car accidents and a little over 9000 of those are rollover crashes.

Subaru stand out to be the only manufacturer to have top ratings for all four crash tests. In every vehicle class it competes. In all 27 vehicles got top ratings, including multiple models from Volvo and the German automaker Volkswagen.

Who didn’t make the grade? Toyota, the world’s leading auto maker with current sales. Then there were Mazda and Mitsubishi both earn top safety mark in 2009 but did not qualify in 2010.

The testers said if your vehicle didn’t make the safety list, that does not mean it is unsafe. Every vehicle out there meets minimum federal safety standard. This study does not say that the vehicle that are not on this list are unsafe, but what this list tells you is that there are auto manufacturers out there doing better job than others when it comes to safety.

The Insurance Institute of Highway Safety says that each time a new criteria like the rollover test is introduced. It takes time for the auto manufacture to design and catch up. However, most would catch up to that safety standard by 2011.

Medical payments coverage pay the medical bills result from an accident up to per person a maximum of $5000. There are no deductibles and no waiting periods under this coverage. Also, prescription drugs related to their injuries are covered.

For example, let’s say you and your passenger were both injured and taken to the hospital. The medical payment of $5000 will cover the costs of the ambulance, the emergency room visit, the doctor visit and the hospital room for up to $5000 per person.

If you’re medical bills cost $7000 and your passenger medical bills cost $3000. The medical payment coverage policy will pay $5000 plus $3000 a total of $8000, will be paid by the insurance. You will have to pay the remaining $2000 on your own.

Some states have a medical payments coverage known as personal injury protection or short for PIT. This coverage may have a deductible and may allow you to collect lost wages and rehabilitation expenses. Those are the two things regular medical payments coverage does not cover.

Liability coverage pays for injuries or damages you or someone else driving your car caused by other people or their property.

The two liability coverage are call
1. Bodily injury liability
2. Property damage liability

Every state has different laws to dictate the minimum coverage you must carry. Some states even require you to prove you have insurance before driving your vehicle and other states use the honor system when you only provide your auto insurance proof when you have an accident or some kind of traffic violation.

A typical state requires minimum coverage is 25/50/10, I will give you some example of what that mean later on.

There are four states that do not require the drivers to carry any liability coverage because it is not require by law but that doesn’t mean you don’t need it. Here are the four states that do not require you to have liability coverage:
1. New Hampshire
2. South Carolina
3. Virginia
4. Wisconsin

Let’s say you have an accident, you were distracted and crashed into another vehicle ahead of you. There were three people in the other vehicle and all suffered some sort of injuries. If you were carrying a liability coverage of 25/50/10, that mean your auto insurance company will cover the cost of any one person’s injury, medical expenses, pain and suffering, and out of work wages up to $25,000 for one person’s injuries.

However, the auto insurance will not pay more than $50,000 maximum payment for all injuries, regardless of the number people and injuries. This is the bodily injury portion. Also, your auto insurance company will pay up to $10,000 for the property damages.

In our example, three people were injured and let’s say there injuries for the medical costs total $75,000. Their vehicle has a damage of $13,000. This means your policy will pay $50,000 for all injuries and $10,000 for the property damages. However, you still have to pay the rest at $28,000. That is 25/50/10.

Who will pay the $28,000? Once a policy paid the maximum limits, you will be responsible for the remaining amount. It is generally recommended that you carry more than the state minimum coverage to protect yourself from this financial risk.

Are you thinking about buying new car insurance and you’re trying to figure what is the best way to do it?

Our recommendation is that you speak with a local agent in your local area, you sit down with them, and you explain what it is that you need.

There are many different types of insurance, types of carriers, and types of limits. It’s all up to you and your budget. Therefore, you can design a program that fit to how much money you want to spend each month and that is going to tell you what carrier and what limits are going to be best for you.

If you think about it, the more premium, the more coverage, the less premium, the less coverage. If you’re ever in the accident you’re always going to want the most coverage but if you have only been paying a little bit amount each month. The chances are you don’t have the proper amount of coverage.

That agent will be able to spreadsheet with a host of carriers and be able to design a policy to fit your needs and your budget.

When applying for auto insurance, there are many factors auto insurance provider has to take in consideration for the cost of your premium. For example, if you live in the city where there are traffic and higher rate of auto accidents, you will end up paying more for your auto insurance than people living in smaller towns. Also, driving experience can also be a big factor for your insurance cost. Younger people with less driving experience pay higher auto insurance premium than mature more experience drivers.

Also, race car drivers are in one of the higher group for high auto insurance premium cost because race car drivers like to drive race cars and speed from zero to high speed on the roads making them in the high risk drivers. Some auto insurance provider has a scale system from 1 to 20, 1 being the least risk and 20 is the highest risk.

If you happen to be a race car driver and never been into an auto accident, you may be able to get discount on your auto insurance rate. However, there are other factors, which auto insurance providers will consider before considering your final premium cost, but you can rest assure that experience race car drivers with no prior accident will get special and lower insurance premium cost when compare to a novice driver.

One day you will end up adding your teen son or daughter to your auto insurance policy. It is every teen dream and every parent’s nightmare. You would already know adding a new driver especially a new teen driver to your auto insurance policy would result in higher premium cost. However, don’t panic there are a number of ways to reduce the cost of your premium, make sure you follow these steps:

Step 1
Most auto insurance providers offer discount to good students who average a B average or above. So doing well in school does pay off.

Step 2
Get your teen driver to complete a driving class. Many auto insurance providers give discount to teens that completed driving school.

Step 3
Get higher deductible. The deductible is one main factor how auto insurance providers decide on the amount of moony you have to pay on your premium. The $500 dollars deductible can lower your premium as much as 25% when compare to a $250 deductible.

Step 4
Drive midsized cars and avoid letting your teen own a fast sport cars.

Step 5
Go online, shop for teen auto insurance, and look for auto insurance that specialized in teen drivers. These type of insurance provide have good deal on teen auto insurance coverage.

Some people may believe by getting arrested for DUI is only a matter of paying for the fine and that is it. Not everyone understand when you are arrested for DUI, not only you pay for the fine, your auto insurance premium will increase. Even if you did not crash your car, get yourself injured or injured another person, you may still paying thousands of dollars in fine, incidentals payments, pay more in your auto insurance premiums and pay thousands of dollars more for your bail.

The moment you drink and drive, you better start thinking about how much it will cost you. For instance, if you get pull over by a police officer and get arrested for DUI. The bail can cost between $150 to $2500 dollars and that is the start. Because you have been arrested for DUI and would have your car towed. Now you have to pay for the towing company as much as $1200 and for some reason you can not pay the towing company to get your car. The city has the permission to auction your car and the city keeps all the money from your car.

Lastly, you insurance premium will jump. Your car insurance company has all computer record with the police department and the car insurance company will know if someone got a ticket or been arrested for DUI. Once your car insurance company finds out about the DUI, you will have to pay higher premium and in some cases, your car insurance premium may triple. Your car insurance company may even drop you completely. When that happen you would have to go somewhere else and pay even higher premium just because you got arrested for drinking and driving.