Lower deductible for insurance to cover carseats?

bnsnyde

New member
I am curious about how to best insure our carseats. (In case something happened).

Carseat replacements go under our homeowners, Allstate says. I thought it was Auto. Weird.

We have a $1,000 deductible for home owner's, so if we crashed in a parking lot (and I know there can be a lot of force even at low speeds), and let's say I want to replace the seats, well, we'd have to pay $1,000 (!) just for my peace of mind, and they'd cover the rest.

So for $35 more I lowered our deductible to $500. So now we'd pay $500. There are close to $2,000 worth of seats in the car.

So is that the best way to do this? Of course in a major accident, we'd pay the deductible to cover the thousands of damage to the vehicle. But in a minor accident, it's very costly to replace seats, in a sense. Make sense? I kind of need to insure the carseats. (And I know Orbit has a replacement program, but it's not free, either).
 
ADS

ketchupqueen

CPST and ketchup snob
Staff member
Car seats only go under homeowner's if they are a) not in your car when they are damaged or destroyed or stolen or b) damaged, destroyed, or lost in a non-crash incident. (Such as, say, someone breaks into your car and steals them.)

If you're in a crash, no matter what they say right now, you will not make a separate claim for car seats, but will file under your auto insurance, because they are considered a part of the occupant restraint system of the vehicle in that case, not "contents." (After our crash CS initially told us they would be under our renter's policy, too, but when we said, "No, that's not right" they transferred us to an actual ADJUSTER who knew what she was talking about and confirmed that yes, those go under the auto policy.)
 

LISmama810

Admin - CPS Technician
You're in Illinois, aren't you? Illinois law requires insurance to replace seats that were occupied in a crash, if that makes any difference in your decision.
 

bnsnyde

New member
Ahh! They told me the WRONG INFO. Was why I was so confused. I called back and they admitted they didn't know the answers to my questions.

It does go under auto and they do replace seats even if no "damage" in an accident.

But I kept the home owner's at $500 for the extra $35. Figure I just ought to keep that at the $500 vs. $1,000.

Craziness. :)
 

emntheboys

New member
Uhh... I'd get a second opinion.

The 'intended use' of a carseat is in the car. When it is installed it is essentially a part of the vehicle so it is covered under comprehensive/collision (whatever type of claim it is) and subject to that deductible. If it is sitting around your house and your house burns down then it is considered personal property under your homeowners.

I would really REALLY hesitate to turn a small claim like that in under a homeowners policy anyway. Insurance companies have really cracked down on the number of claims they allow a customer to have before they cancel them in the last few years. So you have a carseat claim this year, a water or hail claim next year & bam you're dropped.
 

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