Car Insurance Sort Blog

Proposition 17 will be on California voters’ ballots in June, according to Steve Lopez of the Los Angeles Times.  Lopez sat down with the Chairman of Mercury Insurance, George Joseph, for his article “Talking car insurance with Mercury’s top man.”  Joseph is bankrolling Prop 17 because he says it is in the best interest of California drivers.   While Mercury often gets bad press in California, they offer customers low rates and have been the leading independent car insurance broker in California for nearly 50 years.  Maybe the bad press comes from competitors’ attacks?  As a Mercury Insurance customer, Lopez wanted to talk with Mr. Joseph to get his side.

Proposition 17 would offer loyalty discounts to customers even when they switch companies.  If a good customer was insured through Bristol West Car Insurance for years and switched to Mercury Insurance, or vice verse, they could retain their customer loyalty discount.  This sounds like a great advantage for California drivers, but Mercury adversary Consumer Watchdog believes differently.  The company  said that along with that small discount to some consumers would come large increases for others.  They believe that a lot more uninsured drivers would be on the road because of the surcharges that would be implemented for drivers who do not have the industry standard ‘perfect’ records.  This battle will remain strong until the vote in June.