Economical Insurance Auto Insurance Reviews

I switched over to Economical because my wife's company got a discount. Apparently, it only lasts a year because when I got my renewal (Home and Auto), it increased by almost $1000 annually! We have perfect records and absolutely nothing changed. Potentially an issue is where I live (Brampton/Mississauga) but I've never in 20+ years of driving had an increase like this without a reason. I was told by other insurers that Economical took on A LOT of high-risk drivers and guess who's paying for it... EVERY ONE of their policyholders. My broker was also useless saying it was happening all over Ontario but I was able to get another policy elsewhere for the same premium!

Economical is much more expensive than the previous company I was with. I was forced to go with them when my broker no longer represented the other company. It's very ironic because their rates are not economical at all. Why go with them?

I moved out of the province and cancelled my policy. They continued to withdraw monthly fees. When I inquired, they said they would return my funds in two weeks and that the amount will be less than half of the amount that was withdrawn, as I was subject to a cancellation fee. They would not explain how the amount was determined. Good thing there is other insurers.

Was hit from behind and pushed into vehicle ahead. At a full stop at a traffic light. Wanted car repaired but believe they wanted parts to sell so claim to repair rejected. It cost us money that we would not have had to pay if the company had just paid for repairs. The car had minimal mileage and excellent condition prior to the accident. Very frustrated. The client’s wishes of no concern. Paid out more than the cost of repairs would have been. Suggest looking for a different insurer.

I was in a collision which the third party was responsible for the damages, it took 3 months to get an appointment with the garage they suggested, the garage was a disaster in regards to customer services (completely unprofessional when contacted for an ETA), once the vehicle was returned to me it was filthy, dust everywhere in the vehicle from the repairs they had done, they not only returned my vehicle with a missing piece but the windshield was still not fixed (damaged during the side collision which affected the frame of the vehicle and cracked the base of the windshield), when contacted they refused to repair the broken windshield and suggested I open a new claim as if it was from a different collision this was suggested by a manager... The customer service is marked as 1 star due to the lack of professionalism from the handler that was assigned to my file, they refuse to admit that they made a mistake when inspecting my vehicle and are not only refusing to add the windshield to the claim they are "assuming" it was caused by a different collision, logically if there was a different collision the body of the vehicle would be damaged and a different collision would have been reported, which is not the case. The lack of solutions provided, lack of additional research and not following up with the customer has made this review what it is. This company does not have a good reputation and if they continue to provide a poor service with the retention of customers and referrals will diminish greatly.

Had a single-car accident in a different city, two days after the accident Economical took out payment. Three days later pulled my rental. Then questioned my address showed much proof one week later no car rental, no decision. I had to take a bus to the home city. Economical wanted receipt for a bus not to reimburse but to prove I went to home city. Still no help.

Nobody likes insurance companies, but Economical is in a class of their own. We had a single-car accident that they refused to pay out or even cover car rental ($45,000 car value). You have to book a phone call a few days in advance via email. When you finally get to speak to a representative, they are evasive, manipulative and dishonest. They had us running around picking up the police report for them and filling out excessive and redundant paperwork, anything to discourage the claim from moving forward. They even threatened that our claim would "go on the back burner" if we didn't comply with their demands quickly enough. They raised our rates by $1000 per year and messed up the details on the paperwork for our policy. Economical is a predatory insurance company that illustrates why car insurance should be a publicly held institution. You pay in, but you cannot collect.

I was rear-ended by one of their policyholders from Canada while they were visiting the US. Ever since then every day has been an absolute nightmare. This insurance group is awful. 72 hours over the phone in a week mostly on hold or in transferred calls and I still have no more information or assistance than I did the day of the accident. They haven't even sent anyone out to look at the car. They refused to offer rental assistance and could care any less about the loss of use or injuries.

I was in an accident in August where the other driver was at fault. Admittedly I was scammed by the tow truck driver and had my car towed to what I later learned was their own auto body shop by a different name and not a preferred shop. Lesson learned on that matter. However, the insurance company had deemed my car a write off and then changed their mind because I was tricked into signing a work order from the tow driver while at the scene of the accident (yes lesson learned again, read what you're signing even if you are still in shock from the accident). After the insurance company changed their mind they approved over 17,000.00 in repairs of my car (4-month-old car) and when I finally got my car back over 2 months later the driver window wasn't repaired properly and it was noted and agreed that they needed to order parts... 2 trips back for me to check up on the parts and for the second time I'm told they have no clue who I am or what I need and the guy I dealt with (owner) is away. I asked my rep at Economical to please authorize the repairs to be completed elsewhere and to not pay the auto body shop for the deficiencies but they refuse to do it even though they have been following this disaster from the beginning and says the auto body shop didn't charge for deficiencies. Can you imagine an auto body shop keeping a car on their lot for an extra month and not charging the insurance company? No chance! So now I'm stuck with a car that the window isn't working, the car is less than 6 months old and I will have to take it elsewhere to have the repairs done and to pay for it myself. Needless to say, I will be cancelling my insurance as soon as this is over and will never have Economical in my life again.

I was a customer with Economical for 4 years. Never made a claim, only had minor infractions, and never paid less than $200/month for bare-bones liability only. It's worth noting I never missed or was late on payment either. At the time of renewal, I cancelled my policy for a better rate elsewhere. Cancellation in itself was a mess as Economical was difficult about releasing my information to my new provider. Also, if you've ever been on hold with Economical, you know it's a long, physically painful process. The waiting music (that you'll listen to for an average of 30 minutes per call) sounds like someone recorded elevator music over a car radio. I wasn't notified of any outstanding balance on my account when I cancelled the policy but was sent a letter with the remaining amount on my premium. No big deal, Economical has been taking money automatically from my bank account every month for 4 years now. Surely they'd do the same this time around? Except no -- I was expected to manually pay, which would have been great information to provide when I called to cancel my policy. I paid it online once Economical jumped the gun and threatened me with debt collectors less than a month after my policy expired. Confusingly, Economical promptly returned this final payment to me. According to their letter, I actually didn't owe any money. This was annoying since I was threatened with debt collection just the week before, but I got my money back so no harm is done. Just kidding. Economical forwarded my information to debt collectors for failing to pay my bill. The debt collectors were just as confused as me when I explained that I did pay my bill and the money was returned. I had to forward the debt collectors 7 different documents to prove that I did not, in fact, owe any money. Also, while I don't know this for sure, I think those debt collectors sold my phone number to telemarketers because I've been getting phone calls from mysterious numbers non-stop since this all started. Really great, Economical, I appreciate that. Essentially what happened is that Economical's automated system didn't detect I was making a payment on my 2018-2019 premium and instead attributed it to the 2019-2020 renewal that I cancelled. Let's be clear here: Economical doesn't have a real, living human review your account before sending your information to debt collectors. Even a cursory glance at my account history could have prevented this issue. By this point, I've been dealing with the ramifications of cancelling my policy for three months. Three months. All I wanted was assurance that changes would be made to their system to prevent this from happening to others. That's all I wanted and I would have been satisfied. However, Economical couldn't even lie to me about promising that. At the end of my experience, I spoke with three different Economical representatives about getting this resolved so it wouldn't happen again. Instead, all three representatives echoed the same sentiment: "We're sorry! Have you considered speaking to our billing department to pay the balance (again)?" There was no assurance anything would change to prevent others from having debt collectors called on them for system errors. The apologies did not seem genuine and all Economical was concerned with was getting their money - again. In fact, to re-make this payment I had to call and make the payment manually because even Economical couldn't trust their online system to not mess up again. If you have the option, do not associate with Economical. They don't care about their customers, they only care about their customers' money. They're the embodiment of opportunistic bottom-feeders. If their system messes up, you'll spend three months navigating yourself through a resolution to the problem or face the call of debt collectors - probably both.