The Spare Car Should Carry the Lowest Driver Rate

A couple with three cars, a single driver with a sedan and a pickup, a retired household that kept a second car after the commute ended: more vehicles than drivers is common, and the regulation has a specific answer for how the extra one is rated. It is worth a two-minute check, because the wrong assignment can sit on a policy for years.

Who qualifies

Any policy with more vehicles than drivers. 10 CCR 2632.5(b) says: "Each insurer may only use the characteristics of one driver to rate each vehicle." It goes on: if there are more vehicles on a policy than drivers, "the insurer shall assign either a rate for an undesignated driver or the lowest rate for all driver related factors."

The word "assign" matters. The regulation does not leave the choice open: it names the two treatments an extra vehicle can receive, and both point away from loading the spare car with the household's highest-rated driver.

In plain terms, the spare vehicle should not be priced as if your least experienced or most ticketed driver uses it, unless that is really how the household works and the plan assigns it that way.

How to ask for it

1. Count drivers and cars on the policy, and note who really drives what most of the time.
2. Ask the company: "Which driver is rated on each car, and how is the extra car rated: at an undesignated-driver rate, or at the lowest rate for driver-related factors?"
3. Ask for that answer in writing, or for a document that shows the assignments.
4. If an assignment is wrong, give the correct arrangement and ask for the policy to be re-rated from the date of the correction.

What to check on your declarations page

• The listed drivers and, where shown, which driver is assigned to which vehicle. Not every declarations page prints this; if yours doesn't, ask.
• The annual mileage on the extra car. Mileage is estimated per vehicle, so a car that rarely moves should not carry a commuter's figure.
• The use shown for each vehicle. A weekend car described as a commute car is a second error on the same line.
• The coverages on the extra car. Whether it needs collision is a separate decision; our page on a car that sits unused walks through it.

When it isn't worth it

• When someone not on the policy actually drives the spare, such as an adult child who uses it every day. That person needs to be dealt with properly, not left off so the car rates lower.
• When the household's real arrangement puts a higher-rated driver on that car. Describe it truthfully; a convenient assignment that isn't true is a misrepresentation that tends to surface at claim time.
• When you expect the rule to lower the vehicle side of the price. It only controls the driver-related factors; the car's own characteristics and coverages are priced as usual.

The opposite situation, more drivers than cars, is handled differently and depends more on each company's plan. Either way, request a quote listing every driver and every vehicle as they really are.