Personal finance website WalletHub recently quoted Commerce Professor Jeffrey Boichuk in its “Ask the Experts” section, which accompanied a series of posts about car insurance in Virginia.
The question put to Boichuk concerned the pandemic and its impact on the insurance industry: “How do you think COVID-19 has affected consumer demand for car insurance?”
The McIntire Marketing faculty member discussed the decrease in commuting brought about by COVID-19, and the resulting change in consumer attitudes about how insurance rates are determined. He noted that as working from home increased, thereby lowering most drivers’ mileage, consumers have begun to rethink their rates, equating fair insurance payments with the distances they log on the road.
Boichuk notes that the potential insurance policy changes he described in WalletHub are poised to extend beyond odometer readings and take additional measures into account.
“Usage data isn’t limited to how many miles consumers drive. The advent of autopilot technology gives companies vision and sensor data, which they can use to profile how well and how (in)attentively consumers drive. With this information, companies such as Tesla are in a position to use principles from actuarial science to arrive at more appropriate and personalized prices for their customers,” he says.
