What do you get when a lady confuses drive for reverse and the gas pedal for the brake pedal?  The result could be damming for your auto insurance.

Quite often I come across people that say they’re safe drivers and they have enough auto insurance.  Even the safest drivers can make mistakes behind the wheel.  Consider my recent trip to a local Dallas coffee shop.  I cannot help but wonder what conversations she had with her insurance agent.

Upon stopping at the coffee shop with I was greeted by a boarded up window.  My first thought was does the driver have enough auto liability?  For this driver, she could potentially have to pay for medical injuries, property damage to the coffee shop, and what else?  Without diving too deep into the business, health, and life insurance ramifications of this claim, let’s just focus on auto insurance.

Since driver hopped the curve, and created a new drive through window, the guy sitting in the window probably had injuries.  Luckily for the driver, his injuries were minor scrapes and bruises.  However, how much does it cost to treat his scrapes and bruises?  What if you were the guy hit by the car, would you go to work the next day?  Would you file a claim against your personal health insurance?  Do you have health coverage?

The reality is that driver has no clue what kind of injuries will result from this accident.  If the victim of the accident misses time from work, his lost income will result in a bodily injury liability payout.  In the same accident, the victim’s injuries will add to the bodily injury payout on this accident.  The question remains.  How much liability coverage is enough for this accident?  If this driver has the Texas minimum requirements, she only has $30,000 bodily injury coverage.

Now that we discussed the bodily injury liability, what about the property damage liability?  As you can tell, making a new drive thru window

can be quite costly.  In this case, the driver drove through a plate glass window of a coffee shop.  As a result, she damaged all the furniture, the window, wiring, window decorations, and much more.  If she was carrying the Texas minimum coverage, she only had $25,000 of total property damage coverage.  Not to mention,  if the coffee shop had to close for the day, her insurance may be responsible for lost revenues.  Who pays if she the excess if the driver only carries the state minimum?  You guessed it, the driver and owners are responsible for all damages in this case.  While I’m at it, if the coffee shop closes in order to complete repairs, the driver is responsible for that too.

In the end, an accident like this could result in a driver (with minimum limits) paying damages out of pocket.  While the state of Texas only requires you to carry bodily injury liability limits of $30,000 per person, $60,000 per accident and $25,000 property damage, it’s always wise to look at carrying limits above and beyond the state’s requirements.  You never know if you’ll confuse the gas pedal and brake pedal and drive through the window of a coffee shop.