Auto Insurance For Teenage Drivers: How to Minimize It

Teenagers are excited about getting their independence when they pass their road tests. As a parent, however you may be stressed about including your kids on your auto insurance policy. Oklahoma City Insurance companies usually view teenagers as high risk drivers due to their lack of experience and perceived incompetence behind the wheel. Teenagers are often adventurous on the road; they may want to try stunts they have seen in movies or on television. Insurance companies know this, that is why your premiums will increase when your teenager starts driving. Fortunately, there are several factors you can control to minimize the raise in premiums when you add teens to your insurance policy.

Type of Vehicle

Teenagers often like customized, fast and sporty vehicles. These teens enjoy speeding which is exactly what makes them high risk drivers. Insurance companies on the other hand, hate seeing teenagers in fast vehicles. The faster the vehicle, the higher the chances of an accident. Think twice before buying a sports car or other turbo-charged vehicle since your insurance premiums will shoot up. In addition to worrying about premiums, you should ensure that your child drives a car which is even safer than yours because teens are more likely to get into accidents due to their lack of experience and willingness to take risks.

Driving History

Insurance companies favor drivers with clean driving records. If your teenager causes any type of accident, your insurance premiums will rise. Your premiums will also go up if your child gets speeding tickets because breaking driving laws can increase the risk of accident. Teens who have few to no driving related incidents on their records will be seen as a lower risk, so you'll pay less if your kids keep their driving records clean.

Enrollment in a Teen Driving School

All teenagers should take driver's education in order to lower their risk level. Insurance companies will offer lower premiums to kids who are in these types of programs. The grades your kids get in these classes can also significantly impact the premiums. Insurance companies often award a 25% premium discount to teenagers who score a mean grade of ‘B’ or more in driver's education courses.

Driving Frequency

Your premiums will be higher if your teen drives more frequently because every time an adolescent gets behind the wheel, it's considered a higher risk than if an adult was driving. Thus,  if your child is listed as an occasional driver, your premiums will be low compared to if he or she is listed as a permanent driver. If possible, limit your child's use of the car to occasional drives in order to keep premiums low. If you want your child to be able to drive frequently, take extra safety precautions to minimize the risk to your teen and to your vehicle. You might also want to consider getting separate insurance for your teen driver to save money on your premiums.

There are lots of factors to consider when adding teenagers to auto policies. If you are thinking about getting a vehicle for your teenage driver or adding your child to your policy, call an agent at Strunk Insurance today at 800-375-8356 for a free quote.

Insurance A Brief History

The insurance industry is one that affects nearly every aspect of people’s day-to-day lives. People can have insurance on their vehicles, homes, businesses, properties and even lives. The companies that provide these policies even eliminate risks in some cases, such as is the case when they demand additional safety measures on construction sites or offer incentives for safe drivers. The insurance industry, however, did not just appear overnight. It has had a long and storied past.

Insurance is about distributing risk. Merchants would distribute their supplies, wares and other property across multiple ships when traveling across treacherous rivers. This would reduce the risk of loss if any single vessel happened to capsize.  

Insurance became far more sophisticated in Europe’s post-Renaissance period than it was during its ancient roots.  The current model used by insurance companies throughout the world can be traced to 1680, but it continued to develop in the United States over the years, and at one point before the Civil War, the morally deficient practice of allowing slave owners to insure their slaves became somewhat popular. The 19th century also saw some insurance companies, like New York Life Insurance and Trust Company, expand from insuring just local citizens to the people in the entire region around them. This laid the groundwork for modern national insurance companies.

The Social Security Act of 1935 was the first nationally mandated form of insurance in the United States. The passage of this legislation gave rise to the concept in America that insurance was a valid and even ideal way for people to achieve personal economic security. This paved the way to getting insurance for the millions of people in America who have it. Once the federal government accepted insurance as a positive thing, the rest of the country soon followed.

No one can argue that insurance is a benefit for individuals throughout the world, but people didn’t always have this safety net. We live in a world where it’s just accepted that anyone with financial resources can secure insurance if they wish to, so it’s hard to imagine times when this choice didn’t exist. Thanks to ancient civilizations, however, the constant evolution of insurance continued throughout many millennia to lead to the system that we have in place today.  

People have known for thousands of years that insurance policies are a knowledgeable investment. Take their advice and contact an agent at Strunk Insurance for a free Oklahoma City insurance quote today.

Determining the Importance of Income Protection Insurance

Almost everyone recognizes the importance of protecting homes and cars with quality insurance coverage, but what about protecting the most important asset? Homes are certainly valuable assets, and cars are too, but what income? The ability to earn an income is a valuable asset.

For instance, a 35 year old currently earning around $50,000 a year would easily lose over $2 million in potential earnings if the ability to work suddenly ended. Of course, this figure doesn’t account for regular pay increases or promotions that could easily increase this figure exponentially. For most people, income is the most valuable asset they have.

Every day, workers become disabled or ill and lose their ability earn a living. Major illnesses and accidents can occur without warning, leaving workers without the means to make any money. Of course, major incidents aren’t the only issue workers must worry about; workers can lose out on income for just a few months or a year, which can lead to significant turmoil.

Protecting a Worker’s Most Valuable Asset

It’s important to insure homes and cars, but it’s also important to insure income too. An income protection policy can replace as much as 75% of a worker’s income if disaster or illness strikes. There is usually a waiting period of approximately 30 days before becoming eligible to draw, but it also depends on the type of policy.

Income protection insurance provides the necessary funds for workers to continue paying for mortgage, rent, groceries, and more. Without insurance or another form of income, staying afloat can be almost impossible.

What About Disability Pensions & Sick Leave?

Sick leave is designed to cover short term absences. Most workers only have a few weeks of sick leave available. In extreme cases, it’s unlikely that a worker would have accrued enough sick leave to cover the rest of their working lives.

Some workers believe that disability pensions will meet their needs, but most pensions won’t cover the needs and expenses of most workers. If a worker has a mortgage to pay and a family to support, the income won’t go very far. Additionally, workers compensation comprises a safety net for people who are injured at work, but it doesn’t cover illnesses or injuries that occur off the job.

Why Income Protection is Vital

Workers who suffer an illness or injury leaving them unable to work for more than a few days can suffer greatly. In fact, misfortunes such as these can devastate a family. Financial problems can lead to other life issues and difficulties. Protecting family from needless suffering is one of the reasons why income protection insurance is necessary for most workers. Workers who have the right income protection insurance in place can ensure that income remains steady and that injury and illness don’t negatively impact families more than it already has. Contact an agent at Strunk Insurance today for all things related to Oklahoma City Insurance.

The Difference between Negligent and Intentional Acts

Liability insurance coverage is designed to protect policyholders from the effect of their negligence but generally offer no protection when a policyholder intentionally causes damage to another. This disparity makes it important that you understand the difference between negligence and intentional harm.

What Is Negligence

When an individual causes harm to another because she did not act with reasonable care, it’s considered negligence. When an individual is negligent, he can be directly responsible for causing harm or damage to another person but it is clear that the damage is not purposeful; it is due to either an oversight, ignorance of a situation, or poor decisions.

What Is an Intentional Act?

Intentional acts that cause harm or damage are those that the perpetrator purposefully creates with the goal of causing damage to another. An intentional act does not have to be a focused attack on a specific individual; in some situations, just knowing about a potential source of danger and deciding to do nothing about it can be perceived as intentional.

Negligence, Intentional Acts and Insurance

Insurance is not generally designed to protect individuals from their preplanned incidents. Instead, insurance is designed to protect against accidental and unexpected damages. Even life insurance, a policy that pays a benefit out after the death of an insured, has some unknowns. Because while every individual knows that eventually he will die, life insurance policies will generally not be issued if you know that your death is imminent due to terminal illness.

Insurance policies do not give policyholders permission to act recklessly with no consequences. It is there to protect the insured from the financial fallout of accidents, unexpected events, and potentially negligent actions. If you have questions about how negligence and intentional activities can affect your insurance policies and payment of benefits, give us a call at Strunk Insurance today. We can discuss the details of your Oklahoma City Insurance policies and help you better understand what may or may not be covered within them.

Is A High Deductible Plan Right For You?

When you have a high deductible health insurance policy, you’re essentially agreeing to take on a significant portion of the initial medical expenses that you’ll encounter each year. While this type of plan is not right for everyone, it can be a good choice for individuals who:

• Are young and healthy. The younger and healthier you are, the less likely it is that you’ll need regular medical care. And while being a healthy doesn't preclude your risk of having an accident that results in injury, the overall savings you'll experience on your monthly premiums can make facing this risk worth it. In fact, you can take the money you save on premiums and put at least part of it into a health savings account (assuming that you meet the qualifications) and then use those funds to pay your deductible should you have an accident. Since those funds rollover from year-to-year they will still be there should you need them to pay for medical expenses later on in life or for retirement.
• Need a tax deduction. When you have a high deductible health insurance policy with a deductible that meets IRS requirements, you can open a health savings account that allows for a large annual contribution which is tax-deductible. The limits for the contributions change from year to year but in 2012 they are $3,100 for a single-person account and $6,250 for a family account. There is an additional $1,000 catch-up contribution allowed for individuals over age 55.
• It's the only way you can afford health insurance. High deductible health insurance plans have an additional benefit that many consumers don't realize. When you have a high deductible plan, let's say with a deductible of $5,000, you’re expected to pay that first $5,000 worth of medical expenses but you are not doing so at the retail rate charged to consumers who don't have insurance. Instead, the insurance company works with your medical service providers to control the overall cost of treatments. In addition, by giving a defined deductible, they control the overall amount you’ll be on the hook for.

To learn more about the different types of Oklahoma City insurance policies and which might work better for you, give us a call at Alexander & Strunk Insurance today.

Emergency Fund? How About Insurance Policy?

Financial advisors often stress the importance of creating an emergency fund. In this economy, filled with job stress, global uncertainty and fallen business profits often still struggling to reach pre-2008 levels, the wisdom of setting aside six months’ worth of expenses into an emergency savings account is not lost on the average individual. What may be lost on the average person, however, is the actual ability to save that much money when trying to support a family and pay off debts.
An emergency savings account is not the only type of emergency fund that one should consider. Another more affordable way to create an emergency fund is to invest in insurance policies that protect the value of your assets in the event they are lost, stolen, or damaged during an insurable incident.

The Value of Insurance

Imagine how expensive it would be to rebuild your home after a hurricane, tornado or fire. Even with a full emergency savings account it’s doubtful you could afford to pay this expense out-of-pocket. However, for a very small annual premium you can purchase a home insurance policy that does just that. This home insurance policy can even be designed to protect the value of your contents and may pay for loss of use if you are displaced by the insurable incident.
And what about your car? If you were to total your car or if it were to be stolen, could you afford to buy a new one? An auto insurance policy can work as an emergency fund reimbursing you for the value of your car when totaled during a covered peril, paying for a rental car, paying for certain repairs, and even covering your liabilities.
Your family faces an emergency event should you pass away. After your death, how would they replace your income, your contribution to the family, pay for your funeral and reach the future financial goals you set?

 A life insurance policy creates a much-needed emergency fund for your income loss and funeral expenses.

A disability insurance policy creates an emergency fund for income replacement should you become disabled in an event that is not related to work. You can choose short- and long-term disability policies and create a more flexible, accessible benefit than social security provides.
Your Oklahoma City Insurance is a vital component in any emergency plan. Give us a call at Alexander & Strunk and find out all the ways that affordable insurance policies can be designed to provide the protection you need at the time that you need it.

Teaching Kids the Value of Insurance

When teaching kids about finance, parents should remember that insurance is a valuable part of anyone’s financial portfolio and is a concept that children can find difficult to understand. For a few tips to teach your children about the purpose and value of insurance, read on.

• Explain to your children how insurance works. Insurance is meant to make a policyholder whole after they suffer a loss caused by an unexpected peril. Helping your children understand that insurance works to protect the value of their stuff is a great place to start your lessons.
• Give them an example. If your children get allowances or birthday money and they’ve bought a toy or other item with the proceeds, use this situation to create an example of the benefit of insurance. Remind them about how long it took them to get the money to buy the item and ask them how they would replace it if it was damaged in a fire. Then, explain how an insurance policy could provide benefits that would allow them the resources to replace it.
• Discuss the different types of insurance available, the assets each line protects and benefits they provide. From health insurance to life insurance, property insurance to auto insurance, there are many different products that your children should learn about.
• Read the policies with them. If your kids are old enough to understand the nuances of an insurance policy, sit and read your policies with them. Not all at once—that’s a recipe for attention span disaster. But try to make it a fun event to read policies together once a week over a pizza and some music. This will help your children understand what to expect from insurance coverage, help them develop critical thinking skills and can open up the lines of communication for questions.
• Explain the consequences of being uninsured. Don’t be afraid to discuss with your children the consequences of not having insurance coverage. Use your own home and assets as an example. Let them know just how much it would take to rebuild and refurnish your home after a disaster and explain how insurance can make the seemingly impossible, possible.

For more resources and ideas about teaching your children about Oklahoma City Insurance, give us a call at Alexander & Strunk Insurance or stop by today.

Insuring Cash

Most home insurance policies cover the damages associated with theft. If your home is burglarized and your contents taken, you may be able to receive benefits equal to the actual or replacement value of those items. If you have cash or its equivalent in the home, that may be covered by your policy as well.

Cash and Equivalents: What’s Covered

If you have cash, coins, gift cards, and even foreign currencies in your home and they’re stolen or damaged by fire or other covered perils, your insurance company will cover the damages as outlined by your policy. Your policy deductible will still apply but your coverage for cash and its equivalents may have its own limit separate from your general contents limit. It's important to make note of the limits on coverage for cash to ensure that the money you keep on hand does not exceed what you can get reimbursed.

When considering coverage in terms of theft, a typical break-in is not the only situation that could result in stolen cash and its equivalents. There are many individuals who enter your home and have access to cash hidden inside; any of them could take it without your permission. This includes neighbors, party guests, service providers and even friends and non-resident family members.

What isn't Covered

If you lose or misplace your cash and it isn't stolen or damaged in an insurable incident, then your insurance company is not likely to pay the claim. Likewise if cash is stolen from you while you are away from home it may not be covered.

Another instance in which the damage to or theft of your cash might not be covered is if the cash was received through an illegal activity or while you operated an unreported business in your home. Your home insurance company must be aware of any business activities you operate in the home or your claim could be denied and your policy rescinded.

Proving the Existence of Cash

It's critical that you keep records showing that you obtained the cash that you report as stolen or damaged. You can use a bank statement or deposit receipt showing a cash withdrawal, ATM receipts, or possibly even a handwritten bill of sale. Your insurance company may, in the event of a theft, ask for a copy of the police report as well.

If you want to know more about how your Oklahoma City home insurance policy protects you, or you want to increase your limits, give us a call at Alexander & Strunk Insurance today.

How Life Insurance Insulates Heirs from Market Risks

Legacy planning is an important topic for most individuals who have children and grandchildren. The ability to leave behind assets that can work to substantially ease the future financial burden faced by heirs is a powerful motivator to many and creates the ultimate reward after a life spent working hard.

While all of your assets can contribute toward your overall legacy, one of the most important assets to have is a life insurance policy. A life insurance policy not only ensures your heirs a certain amount of money upon your death, it also helps to insulate them from the market risk your other assets may bring to the table.

Investment Losses vs. Life Insurance

When you leave an investment portfolio to your heirs, there is nothing that protects them from a swift decline of stock values after your death. This decline can occur no matter how carefully you researched and invested because stock prices are based on much more than just the value of a company. In fact, a global economic crisis that does not directly impact the companies you've invested in could still result in lost value for your heirs at a time when they can least afford to face it.

With a life insurance death benefit, even in a variable policy, the death benefit is predictable and secure as long as there was no misrepresentation on the application for coverage, no outstanding loans against cash value, the death was not caused by one of the excepted situations, and the premium has been paid on time. No matter how the market fluctuates after death, that benefit remains the same.

Assets and Estate Taxes

A decline in the value of the assets you plan to leave behind does not have to occur just after your death, it can even begin occurring while you are alive and there is little you can do to stop it other than sell your assets, take losses, and then find another place to invest your money. On top of the losses, your heirs may also be required to pay estate taxes, especially as the estate tax exemption falls substantially in 2013. With a life insurance policy, as long as there are no instances of ownership, your heirs can likely avoid estate taxes no matter the exemption amount.

If you are ready to strengthen your estate plan with a life insurance policy, give us a call at Alexander & Strunk Insurance today. We can help you create the best, most effective plan for your heirs.

The Truth about Cyber Risks

In 2008, IT security company Panda Security conducted an assessment of the remittances sent from US companies to international banks. They found that 30 percent of the 1,500 computers they monitored that were involved in these transactions had virus software that was outdated. Even more alarming was the fact that 60 percent of these computers were actively infected by a virus that could have been stealing valuable information from them. That means that only 10 percent of the monitored computers were both free of viruses and protected from potential virus and malware attacks.

Cyber Theft and Your Business

Every business, even one with active anti-virus software, is exposed to cyber risks such as:

• Interception of wire transfers
• Credit card fraud
• Identity theft

You owe it to your clients to protect their data and sensitive information as you would any tangible asset that you had in your possession. But with technology changing so rapidly, it’s almost impossible to guarantee complete protection against cyber theft or fraud. That’s why a cyber theft insurance policy means so much to the success of your business—it can protect you when you are unable to protect your clients.

Hidden Risks

And while you might think your business doesn't have anything of value for a cyber thief to steal, you could be incorrect. For example consider how vital your prospect list is to your company. Without that list of would-be clients to tap into, you would have little opportunity for success in the immediate future and instead, would need to spend your time building up another list. Should a thief decide to breach your computer's security system and take this list, it could result in your prospects’ information being distributed which could erode trust between your company and your prospects and severely limit your future success. Meanwhile that prospect list could be sold to another company who could benefit from your work.

Cyber risk insurance can protect you from risks you didn't even know you faced, which is important because you don't have to be able to imagine the value of the digital information you hold in order for someone to try to steal it from you. When you are ready to protect your business and begin shopping for cyber risk insurance give us a call at Alexander & Strunk Insurance. We can help you understand exactly how this important benefit would protect your company and create a policy with an Oklahoma City Insurance premium you can afford.

Post-Divorce Insurance Adjustments

A divorce can change your entire life almost overnight. It can change where you live, how you live, and what kind of insurance you need. If you're going through a divorce, here are some adjustments you should consider making to your insurance portfolio.

1. Change life insurance beneficiaries: If the current beneficiary of your death benefit is your soon-to-be ex-spouse, you need to consider who you want your new beneficiary to be. You can leave the benefits to a relative, close friend, your children, funeral home or a trust.
2. Get health insurance: If you're currently on your spouse’s health insurance plan then after your divorce you will qualify for COBRA coverage. However you will be limited to the options available on your ex-spouse's insurance policy and you will be subject to COBRA premiums that can include an additional administrative fee. Instead, you might consider getting your own individual health insurance policy with the coverage options you want, the network of doctors you prefer, and a premium you can easily afford.
3. Renter’s insurance: If you are not keeping the home that you and your spouse occupied and are instead moving into an apartment, then you need to consider replacing your Oklahoma City home insurance. A renter's insurance policy not only covers the risk of financial loss to the contents within your apartment (such as your electronics and furniture), but it also covers your liabilities should someone be injured when they're visiting you.
4. Long- and short-term disability: Should you become disabled after divorce you no longer have your spouse’s income to rely on. That makes it very important that you have your own long- and short-term disability policies. That way you can supplement your income after a disability without waiting for Social Security’s approval and waiting period.
5. Auto insurance coverage: Chances are good you shared an auto insurance policy with your soon-to-be ex-spouse. If that is the case then you need to quickly get an auto insurance policy for yourself. Your individual auto insurance policy will not only comply with state mandated insurance regulations but will also cover those events that concern you such as collision, theft and vandalism.

When you're going through a divorce, the last thing you want to think about is how it will change your insurance policies. But to ignore the impact divorce can have on insurance is to ignore the financial risks you face as you head into your new, single life. Give us a call at Strunk Insurance and we can work with you to make all the necessary changes with your new budget in mind.

Should You Keep Insurance after a Job Loss?

After losing a job, you will likely consult your budget and try to find ways to reduce your cost of living during this unexpected and financially challenging period. Unfortunately, many individuals look at their various insurance policy premiums as acceptable expenses to cut. They may begin the process by increasing deductibles and lowering limits in order to adjust premiums down. Then, they may chop out various “optional” benefits within their policies and finally, they allow coverage such as life insurance, which isn’t required by the state or a lender, to lapse through non-payment of premiums.

Treating insurance coverage this way can be one way to reduce immediate expenses, although it’s an activity that can be financially devastating over the long haul. The less insurance coverage you have, the more risk you bear; and after a job loss, you can’t afford any additional financial risk.

Why maintain life insurance? Your family needs life insurance in order to keep their financial lives together after a loss. When you lose a job, your financial position becomes even more unstable, so leaving your family without a life insurance benefit can be devastating. Instead, find out if your insurance company can do an applied premium loan and utilize some of your cash value to make premium payments.

Why not reduce auto insurance coverage? It will be difficult to find a new job, and get to one if you are offered a position, if you don’t have a car. Without car insurance to pay for damages after an accident, or with a high deductible that puts more pressure on you to pay for repair costs, you could be sabotaging your ability to get a job and remain employed again. Not to mention the risk of liability you take on, which can easily wipe out retirement and other savings.

Do you really need that much home insurance? It’s hard enough to imagine how you could afford to replace all your property and rebuild your home after an insurable event that occurs while you are employed, but imagine having to do so when you are unemployed.

Can you put health insurance on hold? Your health is your most precious asset. Without it you can’t work, enjoy your family or have a happy, fulfilled life. The ability to have serious problems detected early and to continue receiving preventative and emergency care measures is vital when you are unemployed. In addition, keeping continuous coverage ensures that your pre-existing conditions won’t be excluded by certain new plans.

If you have questions about how to continue with your Oklahoma City Insurance policies after a job loss, or how to replace those coverages lost after a job loss, give us a call at Strunk Insurance today.