Icky Bicky aka ICBC

[VanessaofBC]

My friends and I used to play this all the time.

Let`s see if it works.

Top Ten Reasons I Hate ICBC

#1. They are running a monopoly on auto insurance in BC. I hate any company that has a monopoly.




Share with me your stories of ICBC and if someone can tell me how they got to be the only guys in town when referring to auto insurance, that would be great.

 

[CJ Tylers]

#2) They allow young people and old people to have reasonably priced insurance, when their accidents raise my rates!
#3) They allow people who had accidents to have a bit of grace, which costs them less, and raises my rates!
#4) They don't arbitrarily raise peoples rates because "they're due for an accident!" grrrrr!
#5) They treat people equally! Why should men and women have the same auto insurance rates? Grrrr!

- Courtesy of Private Insurance



In all honesty, I would like to see a significant discount on secondary use vehicles... having to pay primary insurance on recreational vehicles is pretty painful and, IMHO, a bit of a cash grab. The whole point of insurance is that you are insuring the driver through the plates, so why not pro-rate the secondary insurance

Another thing to do is check out the actual insurance rates across the country. By and large, private insurance where there is no provincial system in place tends to be quite high, from what I've seen. In some cases, it can be prohibitive.

 

[badbadboy]

You just have to buy the very basic from ICBC and you can get the comprehensive, collision and 3rd party liability from other companies like Canadian Direct.

I have had two accidents in the past year where I was rear ended both times. Last one was some woman texting while doing about 80 km/h and the traffic suddenly changed to about 30 km's. My vehicle took a good whack but still survived not to be written off while her's was destroyed.

I got very good service from ICBC and the shop I chose.

6. ICBC are not competitive versus other provinces that have private insurance. Last time I checked other premiums in Alberta with my vehicles, ICBC was roughly about 30% higher than the private sector companies. We are paying for a fair amount of fat even though ICBC has downsized considerably in the past 24 months.

7. I don't like ICBC using premiums to purchase properties. I don't know if they have changed that habit but they used to own every building they were using. Fine if the economy keeps chugging along but now property values have all shrunk and these commercial properties are worth less than what they used to be worth. I couldn't find back up via google but they did have that policy a while back.

 

[DiscreetOG]

badbadboy....you make some interesting points.....Firstly though, comparing ICBC rates with rates in provinces like Alberta is like comparing Apples and Oranges. Check your policies and see what your buying in B C for your $$ versus what your getting in Alberta for you $$. I think you'll find your getting much more for your $$ in B C.
Secondly, every Insurance company in the world invests premiums in real estate, stock, bonds etc.. with interest rates being so low, it's a way of attempting to make money with money to keep premiums down. Finally, everyone uses ICBC as a whipping boy! Why has my home insurance tripled in the past 10 years? And, not only tripled but also my deductible have gone through the roof. Why?,because every time a hurricane take out the Gulf Coast of the Excited States, I (we) pay for it! Auto insurance is ICBC's only business, they invest and spend their money in B C... Don't have a problem with that. Oh, and one more thing...Our premiums would be much lower except for the fact the Government has raided ICBC reserves to the tune of $1 Billion in the past few years to balance their budget!

 

[badbadboy]

badbadboy....you make some interesting points.....Firstly though, comparing ICBC rates with rates in provinces like Alberta is like comparing Apples and Oranges. Check your policies and see what your buying in B C for your $$ versus what your getting in Alberta for you $$. I think you'll find your getting much more for your $$ in B C.
Secondly, every Insurance company in the world invests premiums in real estate, stock, bonds etc.. with interest rates being so low, it's a way of attempting to make money with money to keep premiums down. Finally, everyone uses ICBC as a whipping boy! Why has my home insurance tripled in the past 10 years? And, not only tripled but also my deductible have gone through the roof. Why?,because every time a hurricane take out the Gulf Coast of the Excited States, I (we) pay for it! Auto insurance is ICBC's only business, they invest and spend their money in B C... Don't have a problem with that. Oh, and one more thing...Our premiums would be much lower except for the fact the Government has raided ICBC reserves to the tune of $1 Billion in the past few years to balance their budget!

Seems to me you ought to shop your policy around. I did a new inventory because I upgraded my kitchen, hardwoods and bathrooms. They tried to bump my policy by nearly 33% so I got the broker to shop it around and got the identical coverage plus it only went up 10%.

The Albertan coverage was the same too. I compared notes with a colleague in Edmonton and he had the same coverage but was paying much less. ICBC told me our rates are higher because of a larger population and therefore a greater statistical chance of accidents than in Alberta. Same reason why our rates are higher in Vancouver vs Victoria or Kelowna.

 

[CJ Tylers]

Just looking at car insurance...

Alberta (private) comes out cheaper than BC, but not by much. Ontario (private) is more expensive. This is, of course, comparing people in the prime of their lives (probably female), who have never had an accident (regardless of fault). If you add in high/low age range, probability of a future accident, or an accident in the driving history, BC's pubic insurance gets cheaper by fist fulls.

Also, you are guaranteed to be insured in BC (provided you meet the basic legal and health requirements). Private insurers are under no such obligation, whether or not you are insured is a simple math calculation. If you are getting on in years, your insurance will go up or be cancelled all together (simply because you are "due" for an accident). If you go too long without an accident, your rates go up (same reason, you're over due for an accident).

But yes, it's possible to have cheaper insurance, for a while, in most other places.


DISCREET is also correct, in that the Liberal government (much more so than the NDP) does two things with ICBC (aside from deriding it in public):

1) As a crown corp, they are to be as if they are a private insurance company...ie, turn a substantial profit, yet must also run as a crown agency when it comes to who/how they serve the province. ie, they must take on people that private would see as a liability and turn down.

2) The Liberals see it as a cash cow to raid, over and over and over...in order to try to balance their so called "balanced budgets".

I'm not defending ICBC, there's a lot that should be changed with them... but "private" is not always the best solution. If you're a rich sob who wants to rape and pillage peoples bank accounts... private insurance is the way to go