Approximately one in five Tennessee drivers – some 1.2 million, as of the latest available statistics – does not have car insurance.
If you get hit by one of them, and if you file a claim, you might be the one punished if your insurance premium increases.
A new Tennessee law, which goes into effect on New Year’s Day, might help change that. The 2015 James Lee Atwood Jr. Act, named after a man killed in 2014 by an uninsured motorist, set in motion the creation of an online system that can track in real time – through the vehicle identification number (VIN) – whether a licensed driver has the insurance drivers by state law are supposed to have. Georgia and Alabama already have such a system.
Tennessee, according to the Insurance Research Council (IRC), has the third highest number of uninsured drivers in the country but only the sixth highest number by percentage. Its 20.1 percentage is significantly higher than the national average of 12.6, or about one in eight, drivers.
The new law will require county clerks to check the online verification system for insurance when a driver attempts to renew his or her state tag. A lack of insurance will result in no tag.
The detection of no insurance also results in a $25 “coverage failure fee.” An additional $100 must be paid if proof of insurance is not provided in 30 days.
Police also will have additional enforcement power. If a driver is stopped and has no insurance, police can have the vehicle towed.
Who is likely to be an uninsured motorist?
According to the IRC, across the country, 62 percent are men, 48 percent rent homes or apartments, 35 percent are Hispanic or black, 32 percent have an income of less than $20,000 a year and 22 percent are between the ages of 18 and 24.
The most frequently cited reasons for not having insurance, the IRC says, are that the motorist’s vehicle wasn’t in operating condition, the motorist’s vehicle was in running condition but was not being driven, the motorist couldn’t afford the cost of insurance and the monthly or quarterly premiums were too high.
We hope the law will force many of the more than 1 million Volunteer State drivers to purchase minimum liability insurance, which covers $15,000 for property damage per accident, $25,000 for each injury or death per accident and $50,000 for total injuries or deaths per accident. We’re aware it also is likely to drive – at least at the outset – some vehicle operators underground. That is, they won’t come in to renew their state tag because they don’t have insurance, don’t want to get it or can’t afford it.
Police, then, are likely to find more vehicles without tags and insurance. It will be interesting to track if that results in more police stops overall.
Unlike with health insurance, where an uninsured person is likely to have only an indirect effect on another person, an uninsured motorist can have an immediate and direct effect upon another motorist. If the new law is, in time, able to reduce the number of uninsured drivers – and the consequences on insured motorists – it will have achieved its desired effect.