Tesla Insurance Gaining Steam

Oregon and Virginia Tesla owners are about to get coverage options from Tesla General Insurance, marking the first time the EV company will underwrite its own policies. Previously, Tesla Insurance has been handled by partner companies in states like Arizona,California, Illinois, Ohio and Texas. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is aiming to include “most states” by the end of 2022.

One of the biggest reasons this insurance is better for Tesla owners is its biggest feature: the safety score. Tesla’s insurance was always meant to utilize real-time data collected by the vehicles and scored against certain standards of driving, in order to derive a driver’s Safety Score, and calculate the premium to be paid.

Basically, the system starts out assuming every driver has a score of 90. After that, the system will decide if you’re a “good driver” based on factors like the number of “Forward Collision Warnings” you get, the amount of hard braking that happens, quick turns, tail-gating, etc. Basically, if you’re a dangerous driver, you stay at 90 and pay the highest premium. But, if you drive responsibly, you could get as much as 30%-60% cheaper rates. Tesla has said that it expects “average” drivers to be able to save around 20%-40%.

This is certainly a more concrete way of telling if a driver is dangerous or not, but as an added bonus, Tesla says their premiums will not take into account the gender and age, which is always good news.