Potholes are one of those problems that plague so many of America’s roads these days. For all a city’s efforts, there’s always some leg of everyone’s commute where these gaping voids lay in wait to give us a bad day. Most of the time, they just provide something of a sobering bump, perhaps a little splash of our coffee in our laps on our morning trip to work.
Sometimes, though, they can do some real damage to your vehicle. They can knock your steering out of alignment, they can mess up your rims, flatten your tires, even damage your frame or axles if you hit a big enough one with enough speed!
Well, accidental damage like this is what your car insurance is for, right? Well, back up for a second, because you can’t be 100% certain that your coverage includes pothole damage. This one’s a bit tricky, because in many cases, coverage isn’t labeled as pothole damage directly, which is a bit of a veil with which a lot of companies have been known to hide the fact they do not, in fact, provide coverage for this kind of damage.
There have been a lot of crackdowns on this in recent years, though, so most decent plans do have some level of pothole damage coverage. The real trick is how it’s itemized in a policy, and how it’s categorized across the board.
Collision coverage in many places (Chicago and New York being prime examples) often cover sudden, accidental damage from potholes, just as it covers damage from curbs, parking partitions, shopping carts in parking lots, and other such unpredictable surprises that await the average driver. However, potholes are a problem in more than one way.
Potholes can indeed very suddenly do immediate damage to your vehicle, but they can also work overtime to do collective, gradual damage from prolonged driving over them. When this happens, many policies out there do not provide coverage that really fits the situation.
This leads to why it’s very important to consider the types of roads you anticipate having to navigate when choosing your provider and coverage policies. So, does this kind of coverage exist, and if so, what form would it take?
The truth is, there is no direct coverage for this type of damage, unfortunately. However, many policies have significant deductibles that can be placed towards this kind of gradual damage, more so with sudden damage from unexpected run-ins.
At the end of the day, there’s nothing for it but to do your best to avoid particularly bad roads, and to drive smartly when you find yourself unable to avoid them properly. And, when choosing your plan, you’ll want to determine your deductible wisely, to account for those sudden, surprise sources of damage that can happen to the best of us, no matter how careful we are.
So, does insurance cover pothole damage? Yes and no, as irritating of an answer as that may be.
To get more insight into this and other precarious issues with insurance, fill out our contact form below or call us today. We’re happy to clear anything up we possibly can!