Progressive Insurance "Snapshot" or other usage-based car tracking thingies

[RainyDay]

Has anyone used Progressive's Snapshot to get a lower insurance rate?  Or a similar one from another insurance company?  What are your thoughts?  Did you end up with a lower rate for being a decent driver?

I understand Progressive can RAISE your rates if it turns out you're a riskier driver. 

[dandarc]

We did but it was so long ago that I don't remember what the outcome was on rates. I do remember that device being in the car triggered my wife's anxiety for some reason, so on the whole was a bad idea for us. Of course we didn't know that when we signed up.

[therethere]

Don't do it. You won't get much more than a 5% discount for perfect driving. I put one in once, because I drove <200 miles a month. After two months, where I barely drove at all. They told me they couldn't log enough data to get a discount....

If barely using your car, and having no hard brakes during that time, doesn't give you a discount I don't see the point.

[Metalcat]

There's simply no bleeping way I'm giving an insurance company information about my driving behaviours.

That will never, ever happen voluntarily.

[Tigerpine]

I did it once some years ago.  I, too, would recommend against it, unless you're REALLY trying to optimize your expenses.

The thing beeped whenever it logged a "hard brake".  They're much easier to trigger than you'd expect.  I don't remember the savings exactly, but I remember being quite disappointed with the result.

If I remember correctly, 90%+ of my driving during that span was my normal daily commute.

[SquashingDebt]

Seconding that it's remarkably easy to trigger a "hard brake" alert.  Especially when I was driving in hilly areas.  Virtually none of the times I made it beep were at all unsafe.

Would not recommend.

[dandarc]

That's gotta be what bothered my wife - too much beeping.

[Sibley]

I tried Allstate's for a while. The problem is that it can only tell what the vehicle is doing. So, hit the gas hard? That's bad. Never mind that you hit the gas hard to speed up to get away from the swerving driver - thus avoiding an accident. Same with hitting the breaks. All it can tell is that you hit the breaks, not why.

I understand the limitations, and I don't know how to get around them. I prefer to stand by my driving record. I did terribly with the Allstate tracker. My friend did great! Difference being that I've had zero accidents since 2012, and my friend has had 10+ claims that I know of, at least half of which were avoidable if she were a better driver. Clearly, I'm doing something right. I turned the tracker back in and told them why - that it only gave them a very narrow view into my driving and I prefer not to be penalized because I don't have accidents.

[markbike528CBX]

I'm keeping this idea so I can get my wife laughing uncontrollably at the thought of putting a such a device on my car.   I drive like I used to race motorcycles, braking hard, hitting revline frequently, concerned about having at least two wheels on the ground, etc.

I'm getting better, but my wife's standard is school bus driver, as that is her experience and her driving style.

[NumberJohnny5]

One of our cars has a built in tracker thing. Tried it out, it says I'm a better driver than my wife (I knew better than to tell her that). That said, a LOT of times I'd get a 0 score. I don't drive recklessly, in fact the last claim I had was back in the 90s (around 98-99, someone hit me in a parking lot...got a payout that bought us our first washer/dryer). I do sometimes drive defensively...leave too much room between you and the car in front, and everyone swerves in, making it more dangerous than if I left half a car length (I'm exaggerating...barely). You might say...just drive slower, what's the rush? No rush at all...but now everyone is making a point trying to rear end me constantly. Speeding up, almost hitting me, swerving at the last minute, dashing around, swerve in front, hit brakes...it's quite predictable really. Sometimes you just gotta drive crazy to be safe. Plus those little black boxes don't care if you hit the brakes so you wouldn't run a red light...just coast on through, almost hitting the side traffic...that's safe! Apply the brakes with moderate force so you stop at the line instead of clearly running a red light, and you got people almost rear ending you and honking madly as they fly past you, nearly wiping out someone who pulled out because the light turned green for them.

I hate Houston traffic. There's even a section I try to avoid because EVERY SINGLE TIME I see someone almost get into an accident. Just the other day the gps routed me there, but the exit was just before the really bad spot, so I figured I'd be ok. Nope, just ahead of me someone swerved over to take the exit, nearly causing a wreck. If you're from the area, you probably know where I'm talking about...except I bet there's multiple such spots. Area I'm talking about is US-59N just before the I-610 interchange. EVERY TIME there's at least one near miss, if not more than one.

[dandarc]

I think it is @Cheddar Stacker who wrote about a former boss (co-worker?) "Schmuck Driving" - sounds like Houston has many folks of that philosophy @NumberJohnny5

[SoBurntImCharred]

There's simply no bleeping way I'm giving an insurance company information about my driving behaviours.

That will never, ever happen voluntarily.

I could not agree with this sentiment more strongly. Consenting to be tracked by your insurance provider equates to a ton of downside risk for you, on top of other privacy concerns, in exchange for a potential discount that is not guaranteed and has a poor correlation to wise driving decisions.

I have an aversion to any tracking device or app that wants to collect my data and use it to build out my broader digital profile, but that's another conversation.

Don't do it.

[Metalcat]

There's simply no bleeping way I'm giving an insurance company information about my driving behaviours.

That will never, ever happen voluntarily.

I could not agree with this sentiment more strongly. Consenting to be tracked by your insurance provider equates to a ton of downside risk for you, on top of other privacy concerns, in exchange for a potential discount that is not guaranteed and has a poor correlation to wise driving decisions.

I have an aversion to any tracking device or app that wants to collect my data and use it to build out my broader digital profile, but that's another conversation.

Don't do it.

I simply don't trust that the data won't be used against drivers in the future, especially since it records perfectly reasonable driving behaviours as "bad". Breaking hard is a great thing for not killing people sometimes

I just DO NOT trust how insurance companies use information. Their number one mandate is to find excuses not to pay out on policies and to raise premiums. There's no god damn way they invested in this technology, hardware, and aggressive marketing campaigns just to give "good drivers" a nominal discount.

No fucking way.

[SoBurntImCharred]

I 100% agree and dread that broader market acceptance of this horse shit will eventually lead to tracking as the default insurance option with an option to opt out for an additional fee.

[Cheddar Stacker]

I think it is @Cheddar Stacker who wrote about a former boss (co-worker?) "Schmuck Driving" - sounds like Houston has many folks of that philosophy @NumberJohnny5

Guilty as charged. Hi dandarc and everyone!

[dandarc]

I think it is @Cheddar Stacker who wrote about a former boss (co-worker?) "Schmuck Driving" - sounds like Houston has many folks of that philosophy @NumberJohnny5

Guilty as charged. Hi dandarc and everyone!

You'll be glad to know I finally came around on not paying off the mortgage. Cost me at least $50 grand, but I did eventually listen . . .

[MilesTeg]

Has anyone used Progressive's Snapshot to get a lower insurance rate?  Or a similar one from another insurance company?  What are your thoughts?  Did you end up with a lower rate for being a decent driver?

I understand Progressive can RAISE your rates if it turns out you're a riskier driver.

I was dumb enough to try one for our seldom used car hoping to get a significant discount to for the extremely low mileage.. It set a crazy standard for 'safe driving' and resulted in $10 of saving per 6 month. And the monitoring is incapable of taking context into account and sometimes discouraged proper driving. So, braking somewhat hard on a yellow light was flagged as serious. Properly accelerating on an on ramp was flagged as serious, etc.

As someone else wisely said: these things ate about making the company money not saving you money.

[Dicey]

I think it is @Cheddar Stacker who wrote about a former boss (co-worker?) "Schmuck Driving" - sounds like Houston has many folks of that philosophy @NumberJohnny5

Guilty as charged. Hi dandarc and everyone!

Cheddar!! You're still missed around here. Update us any time!

I'm sure @couponvan has some experience on this topic.

I'm firmly in @Malcat's camp.

Here's my recent experience, from the other side of the coin. My parked car was sideswiped by a driver who had purchased MetroMile just 30 days before on her old-ish Lexus. Turns out they had allowed her to buy only $5k in Collision coverage. Though my damage wasn't over that, including two weeks rental car fees drove the number higher. We took the offered $5k cash payout, but it took well over two months to see a check from MM. And then they started bombarding me with ads for MM in my inbox. I couldn't hit "Unsubscribe" fast enough, although the adjuster did seem to be a nice guy.

More stupidity: the driver had her own dental practice and was over 65. Talk about being penny wise and pound foolish.

[Car Jack]

Maybe 6 years ago, my insurance company had a trial program for teen drivers.  It was a combination of tracking ability for parents via a web site and a future discount tool.  It plugged into the OBD port.  I got it, installed it and set up the website.  It was useful as a parent tool as it had a map for each trip with speeds listed by clicking any part of the trip.  Hard braking and hard acceleration were noted and I could have it send me a text if the car exceeded a mph that I set.

Ok, so the good.  I knew where my son was anytime he was out.  I could see when he did donuts in the local abandoned parking lot.  I could see his speeds.  The ins co did not use the data for anything.

The bad.  The "hard braking" and "Hard acceleration" settings were completely flawed.  When I installed the device, I decided to test the website features, so I backed out of my garage carefully.  I then drove more carefully than a driving instructor with a kid holding raw eggs in his hands.  I went around the block.  I eased into braking and eased into starting.  Corners were slow.  I got home and went in to see what the benchmark perfect driving loop of about 1 mile would look like.  Well, alrighty then.  It registered 18 "hard braking" and 5 "hard acceleration" events.  So for me, I understood that looking at my son's maps later on, I should ignore all of their stupid events and focus on only speed, donuts and where he was.  I would never put one of these in my car to determine my insurance cost.

[ChickenStash]

Personally, I wouldn't choose to do use one of those gizmos. All they need to know is that I have no accidents or tickets (recently *ahem*).

It might be fun to get one next time I head to a track day. Three days of nothing but hard braking, sharp turns, aggressive acceleration, and high speeds. Gizmo would probably self-eject while screaming as it jumps out the window.

[markbike528CBX]

Personally, I wouldn't choose to do use one of those gizmos. All they need to know is that I have no accidents or tickets (recently *ahem*).

It might be fun to get one next time I head to a track day. Three days of nothing but hard braking, sharp turns, aggressive acceleration, and high speeds. Gizmo would probably self-eject while screaming as it jumps out the window.

And.. you'd be able to brag about your on-car telemetry/ sensor suite to all the trackday competitors.   Or just sneak one on a F1 car :-)