Caveat Emptor is a Latin phrase which means: “Let the buyer beware” and is can certainly be applied to cheap insurance quotes. Cheaper insurance is not always the best insurance, and you need to look carefully at what you are getting, or not getting for your money. It is very easy when times are tough to look only at the monthly payment to make your insurance buying decision, but look carefully because it could cost you much more in the long run.

The insurance business is a highly competitive business and there are companies or even agents of companies that will be a little less than honest when preparing an insurance quote for you. There are also many places online now to get quotes on insurance, and you may not always be aware of which company is actually giving you the quote. Insurance is not always a “buy here, pay here” kind of business and often there is one company who gives you the quote, another company that manages the policy and a completely different company that deals with a claim. It is a good idea to check out each one of the companies with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) that deal with your insurance policy for any complaints of fraud or a poor claims track record.

There are many insurance companies out there that provide good, honest customer service and stand behind the policies they write, but as in any business, there are companies motivated by greed who do business with an “anything goes as long as there is a profit involved” ethic. Some of these shady agents will lower the amount of your quote by applying every discount in the book, regardless of whether or not you actually qualify for the discount. Of course, when the policy is written, the amount you are required to pay is quite a bit higher than the quote, which will then be blamed on you for not qualifying for the discount, or failing to disclose some bit of information.

These agents lure you in with a very low quote and are hoping that your old insurance company will not take you back after canceling, so even though you are paying more, substantially more, than you thought you would, in order to maintain insurance coverage, you are kind of stuck. You become a customer by default, but a paying customer anyway they can get you.

If you are given an insurance quote that looks too good to be true, chances are you’re right. Be sure to look closely at any quote you are given and check for things such as unrealistic deductibles and discounts for things which you obviously don’t qualify. An example might be a discount for having an additional line of insurance that you don’t have, or a discount for a defensive driving course which you haven’t taken. If you see any of these warning signs of padding the quote, then you are probably better off sticking with your current insurance provider, or looking somewhere else.