Does The Hartford offer gap insurance?

To find out if you have gap insurance, you should check both your existing car insurance policy and the terms of your loan or lease. Drivers can get gap insurance through their insurance company as an add-on or separately through their auto lender, so it’s important for drivers to check both places.… read full answer

How To Know If You Have Gap Insurance

1. Check with your car insurance company.

You can look through records such as your recent bills, or you can log in to your account on the company’s website. If this fails, you should call to ask about your coverage.

2. Check with your auto lender.

If you didn’t buy gap insurance from your normal insurance company, you could have purchased it from the dealership, bank, or credit union that supplied you with a loan or lease. It can be easy to overlook gap insurance from one of these sources since it’s sometimes included in your contract automatically.

3. Check your financial documents.

If you do not have gap insurance through your dealership, lender, or car insurance company, you probably are not covered. But as a last resort, you can look through your financial records – such as your online bills, credit card statements, and checkbook – to try to find some clues.

Gap insurance, which covers the difference between your loan balance and the car’s actual value, can come from a dealership, bank, credit union, or car insurance company. It’s unlikely that you bought a stand-alone gap insurance policy without realizing it, so your first step should be to check with the obvious candidates.

Finally, if you realize you don’t have coverage, check out WalletHub’s recommendations on when gap insurance is worth it and where to buy gap insurance.

The Hartford is so cheap because the company offers a wide variety of discounts that almost anyone can get. A minimum coverage policy from The Hartford costs an average of $72 per month, and The Hartford premiums can be made even cheaper by taking advantage of discounts such as safety features discounts and paid-in-full discount. Plus, The Hartford rewards customer loyalty with discounts for insuring more than one car and bundling multiple policies, such as home and auto.… read full answer

Average Monthly Rates for The Hartford vs. Top Competitors

Note: Premiums are representative of a 45-year-old good driver in CA; individual premiums will vary.

The Hartford is especially cheap for young drivers in particular. That’s because The Hartford has special savings opportunities for drivers in this category, such as discounts for students who maintain at least a B average.

Your final premium is based on a variety of factors, though, such as your driving record, insurance history, and more. Every insurance company determines their rates differently, so even though The Hartford is among the cheapest car insurance companies, the only way to confirm you’ve found the lowest price is to compare quotes from multiple companies.

To learn more, check out WalletHub’s review of The Hartford and see The Hartford’s full profile.

Gap insurance takes 5-45 days to pay the policyholder after a claim is filed. For drivers to receive a gap insurance payout, the car first needs to be declared a total loss, and the insurance company needs to accept the claim.

State laws also dictate how long an insurance company has to pay for a claim. For example, insurers in Texas must pay within five days after accepting a claim. Some other states, like Massachusetts, do not have a specific limit, saying only that an insurer must pay within a “reasonable” amount of time.… read full answer

Factors That Affect How Long it Takes for Gap Insurance to Pay

Insurance companies will generally declare a car a total loss within 30 days of the initial claim being filed. However, more complicated situations take longer to settle, such as:

• Accidents involving multiple drivers
• Medical bills
• Unclear fault determination

Once the car has been officially established as a total loss and the insurer agrees to pay for gap coverage, the company will begin to process the gap payment. Since gap insurance pays for the difference between a car’s actual cash value (ACV) and the balance on its loan or lease, gap insurance payments are usually sent straight to the lessor or lender.

How To Speed Up Gap Insurance Payout

To get the fastest possible gap insurance payout, be sure to check your policy details and follow any instructions from your insurance company. For example, some insurers require you to keep making payments to your lender or lessor while the claim is being investigated.

Also make sure to send the insurance company any necessary documents, like a copy of the police report, and promptly sign and return all paperwork. And if needed, check your state’s laws to see if there’s a specific window during which your gap insurer is required to pay.