January 13, 2017

A new car insurance law all Tennessee drivers should know about

January 13, 2017/ Jason Tucker

If you live in Nashville (or anywhere else in Tennessee) and drive a car, 2017 brought an important change you should know about: the implementation of the James Lee Atwood Jr. Law, aimed at whittling down the number of uninsured drivers in our state.

Up to now, we’ve had a startling number of those uninsured drivers — according to legislative analysis done around the time the Atwood Law passed, in 2015, more than 1 million uninsured vehicles were on the road in Tennessee, with around 20 percent of our drivers shirking their car-insurance responsibility. That puts us near the top of an unflattering list, with the sixth highest percentage of uninsured drivers in the country. This law means to change that.

The Atwood law went into effect as of Jan. 1, 2017, and here are the basics you should be aware of, as a Tennessee driver and car owner: The Tennessee Department of Revenue will now be regularly verifying your car insurance with a new online system, and law enforcement agencies can access and review that information regularly as well (not just when you go to renew your registration). Those drivers who can’t verify coverage will end up facing increased fines, ramping up if the issue isn’t addressed.

Nashville insurance insight: Why using an agent can be easier, faster and better

January 08, 2017/ Jason Tucker

I’m kind of smack in the middle of Generation X, so while I didn’t have a smartphone in my bassinet, I did come into adulthood in the Internet age. So I get it: We’ve become accustomed to taking to the laptop to DIY just about everything.

We research our restaurant options with the intensity of vetting a VP pick. Dissertations have been finished with less research than we put into the plane-ticket buying process. There’s a sense of taking the power back in all that, and a belief that we now have the ability to get the best deal for the best price, if we’re willing to put in the work.

The side effect, though, is that by eschewing legacy service industries like travel agencies (and, yes, insurance brokers) in favor of Internet sleuthing, we often do all that extra work, only to end up with purchases that are an imperfect fit, at equal or higher prices.

Welcome to the Tucker Coverage blog: Insurance info for a modern Nashville

December 30, 2016/ Jason Tucker

It's almost a New Year, and I'm starting it off with a new addition to the Tucker Coverage website: our new blog.

In the coming weeks and months, I'll be sharing lots of info, advice and experiences here, from recommendations on the type of insurance coverage you might need and want as you move through life's milestones, to pitfalls you can avoid by finding the right home, auto and renter's insurance. (We go well beyond those types of insurance, too -- whatever insurance needs you might have, let me know, I'd be glad to help.)

I hope this'll be a valuable resource to Nashvillians in need of insurance guidance, and I hope it'll be a fun read (I'll make sure to share a fair share of interesting/bizarre insurance facts, particularly on our Instagram).

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