How to Save Money on Commercial Auto Insurance

Commercial auto insurance is every bit as necessary as personal auto insurance when it comes to keeping your business practices legal and protected financially. For companies that use several vehicles, this type of auto insurance is also known as fleet insurance.

But whether your company uses one vehicle or a hundred vehicles, there are several ways to save money on commercial auto insurance.

Here’s what you need to know:

Strategies for saving money on commercial auto insurance

There are three major strategies for saving money on commercial auto insurance. These choices hold the biggest potential for lower insurance rates but also carry drawbacks that must be considered before making any final decisions.

• Raise Deductibles/Lower Limits: This speaks to the basics of insurance polices. So long as your business is adequately capitalized, you probably won’t have much trouble covering a higher deductible for the occasional claim. This can lead to much lower premiums that are easily worth the risk. Likewise, you should take a hard look at worst-case scenarios involved with your business fleet activity. Lowering insurance limits from, say, one million to a half million can also lead to much lower premiums.

• Hire Safe Drivers: If you restrict your drivers to individuals with clean driving records and/or those with commercial driver’s licenses, you can frequently achieve savings of 10-20 percent on your insurance rates. Of course, finding reliable employees is hard enough under the best of circumstances, and restricting your fleet drivers in this way may turn out to be impractical.

• Buy Multiple Policies: If you’re just starting your business or several of your insurance policies are nearly up for renewal, you should ask insurance companies to give you a quote for bundling your auto insurance, business liability, and any other type of insurance your business might need.

It may not seem to hold much potential, but some insurance companies offer discounts of up to 20 percent for multiple policy holders.

Finding discounts for commercial auto insurance

Once you’ve established your minimal auto insurance needs and tweaked your policy to deliver the most affordable rates, it’s time to drill down and look for individual or fleet insurance discounts that can further lower premiums with hardly any effect on your actual insurance benefits.

• Versatile Auto Insurance for Owners: As a business owner, there’s a good chance you use a vehicle for both personal and business purposes. In this case, you may have the option to place your vehicle under your private or commercial auto insurance policy.

The vehicle will need to be placed under your own name or your business’s name, according to how you plan to insure the vehicle. But with substantial savings under one plan or the other, it can worth the necessary paperwork.

• Stay in Business: This one sounds comical, but insurance companies like to know they have a customer who is easily able to pay their premiums and may renew their policies for years to come. Three years is the benchmark for many insurance companies and may bring discounts of up to 5 percent.

• Payment Structure: On a similar note, if you’re able to willing and pay premiums in full at the outset of the policy term, you’re likely to receive another discount of about 5 percent. By paying upfront, you allow the insurance company to immediately invest your premiums, helping them to generate extra revenues.

Ready to shop for fleet insurance?

There are few tricks or substantial differences when it comes to shopping for commercial vs. private auto insurance. Online quotes are best as they allow you to quickly review quotes and discuss policy terms from the comfort of your business office or home.

RELATED: How to Buy Commercial Liability Insurance

Simply fill out our easy online form, and NetQuote will start matching you with insurance companies immediately. Finally, here’s the information you’re likely to need to generate accurate insurance quotes and streamline the process.

• The driver’s license numbers and basic driving records for each driver you wish to place on the policy.
• VIN numbers and relevant safety features and/or modifications for each car you wish to place on the policy.
• If you currently have commercial auto insurance, you’ll want to have that policy on-hand as well to prove you’ve maintained continuous coverage and to compare premiums.

See how much you could save today on your insurance. Get your free business insurance quotes today.