Claim Status After Insured Dies

[badlanders]

My father in law had two claims approved by State Farm for two separate accidents he had in May of this year but never had the work done. The claim numbers are on the estimates that he had done, he just never took the car in to have the work done. He passed away in November. His insurance is still paid up. Are these claims still payable now that he is dead?
His car is in Arizona which is where the estimates were done. I would prefer to have the work done in Colorado where I live but am not sure what is legal/allowed, etc. Any suggestions will be much appreciated!

 

[djs]

The claims are still valid, but, you need to get busy processing them.
Step one is to see if State Farm wrote a check for the claims. They may have, it could have been cashed or sitting around somewhere.

You'll have to call State Farm claims, but for them to talk to you, you'll have to have some paperwork that shows you are the executor of the estate. Even if you don't have this yet, call claims anyway and have the pull the claim out of the archive it will be in by now. If no check was ever written, they will still pay for it if they were liable for the coverage.

Claims will also answer your question about fixing the car in another state. I doubt this will be a problem, but I haven't ran into this issue before, especially with the delay, so I'd check with them and then decide.

Dan

 

[FullAuto]

Was the car paid for or did he still owe on it? He would have been paid by now either way. If he owned the car, you can call the 800 or 888 number on the top of the estimate(s) and ask if the checks have cleared. If not, he has them sitting somewhere and you can just cancel and have them reissued. If there was a loan on it, the check would have been made to him only if the damage was below $5k net (after deductible). If the car has a loan and the damage was greater than $5k net, which is unlikely since he went all this time without fixing it, then it would have been a two party check to either him and the bank or him and a bodyshop. Basically, he was likely already paid. Just call and see if the checks cleared.


Having it repaired in another state is no problem. There have likely been price changes on the parts that were written in the estimate months earlier. There are also likely labor rate differences and tax rate differences. Take the car to the shop in CO and give them the estimate. If their rates are higher or parts are more expensive, they will send in a supplement and the entire estimate will simply have the profile altered for current parts prices and CO labor rates. If the rates are less in CO, they may try to just keep the additional. Technically, they should charge their rates and allow you to keep the difference (or actually just apply if to your deductible).


There is a major military base close to me and we handle out of state claims and people coming in with out of state estimates after being transferred all the time. It's not a big deal.