So you heard or saw an advertisement for low cost auto or motor vehicle insurance and you are thinking of making a switch: DON’T DO IT until you have read about and considered all aspects of such insurance coverage. Otherwise, you might have saved a few bucks, but exposed you and your family to inferior coverage—and, in case of some hard-nosed companies, exposure to being sued, should you ever cause an accident.

We want to invite our readership to consider some of important factors that ought to come to mind when one is selecting a company for auto or motor vehicle insurance. The airwaves are full of advertisements, and most of them feature some combination of alleged advantages in cost and fast service.

The problem is, there is a lot more to auto insurance than just those two factors, and we believe factors we list herein are MORE important than just fast service or cost. The fact is, auto insurance will most likely come to your rescue at some point, so it's imperative to purchase a worthwhile policy.

The very first thing to consider is your knowledge of product you are about to buy. How can you make a knowledgeable decision, comparing one company’s coverage to that offered by another, unless you know what each component of policy will do for you?

DO NOT COMPARE one insurance company with another until you have done necessary research. Insurance companies and their practices just differ too much to allow one to assume certain practices are “standard throughout industry”. For example, while your company may pay for chiropractic treatments for your eighteen months, low-cost carrier you are considering might have a hard-nosed policy of terminating chiropractic benefits after only four months. Wouldn’t you agree that a person should know that type of defect before jumping in with a new company?

Glossary of Terms to Consider When Buying Insurance:

Here is a brief glossary of terms you will encounter during your research: 1.Full Coverage: You better not rely upon this term at all, since it DOES NOT MEAN that you have full, comprehensive coverage. Instead, all this term indicates that you have all minimum coverage for your state of residence; it does not necessarily mean you will always be fully covered, since there are a lot of insurance provisions available in addition to minimum coverage.

2.Split Limits and Combined Single Limits of Liability: Have you seen your bodily injury liability limits denoted as (25/50/25), or something similar? Split limits of liability provide for separate coverage limits for bodily injury (or Underinsured Motorist coverage). In this example, limits are $25,000 per person bodily injury, $50,000 per accident aggregate bodily injury, and $25,000 per accident property damage. A combined single limit policy has one coverage limit for total cost of injuries and damage, but you will rarely see them because split limits of liability are much more common. 3.Policy Limits Per Person: The maximum amount of money your insurance company will pay out for any one individual for bodily injury losses; many states have minimum required limits.