Should You Purchase Towing Insurance for Your Teen Driver?

If your teen has recently obtained his or her driver's license, you may still be evaluating your insurance options, including coverage for towing, roadside assistance, and even some minor repair and maintenance items. Due to your teen's relative inexperience behind the wheel and their higher likelihood of becoming involved in a crash, insuring your teen driver can cause your insurance rates to rise. How can you determine whether optional coverage like towing insurance is worth the extra cost? Read on to learn more about towing coverage so that you can evaluate the various factors that may go into your decision to purchase this coverage for your teen driver.

What benefits can towing coverage provide?

Towing coverage can be especially beneficial for teen drivers, due to their penchant for inadvertently locking doors, losing keys, or leaving lights or other battery-draining devices on overnight. If your teen's auto insurance coverage includes towing coverage, your teen should be able to call out a service company whenever he or she locks keys inside the vehicle, is stuck dealing with a dead battery, or suffers a flat tire on the highway or interstate. Because it can be rare to have a service call that involves towing and costs less than $35 (plus an additional $2.50 to $5.00 per mile the vehicle is transported), this coverage can often pay for itself if your teen driver needs multiple tows, battery jumps, or other emergency services over the course of a year or so.  

How can you decide whether towing coverage is worthwhile for your teen driver?

Before committing to towing coverage, you'll want to carefully examine any fine print on the insurance policy being offered. For example, some policies that offer towing coverage will restrict this coverage to vehicle breakdowns or other mechanical problems that occur while the vehicle is on the road, rather than situations in which the vehicle gets stuck in mud, rising flood waters, or other conditions that require immediate assistance. Depending upon your teen's planned usage of his or her vehicle, full-vehicle coverage that can provide some reimbursement in the event your teen gets stuck while off-roading may be a wise investment. But on the other hand, a policy that silently exempts coverage for this type of incident may not be worth the money you've already paid toward policy premiums. 

You'll also want to evaluate the cost of towing coverage compared to the cost of a single-service call to have your teen's vehicle unlocked or hauled off on a trailer to be examined by law enforcement officers. In many cases, a full year of towing insurance costs less than a single jumpstart would, and that makes an investment in additional insurance a no-brainer. 

Talk to your insurance company and companies like R & R Towing to find out what kinds of rates they can offer you. 


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