rchase Posted January 8, 2016 Report Share Posted January 8, 2016 Today I discovered I need to move my bikes to another insurance provider. I got a non renewal notice because my bike "Exceeds the maximum allowable amount". I called to ask about and they offered to have an underwriter review my policy and perhaps get an updated appraisal to make them less uneasy. I then discovered with my chat with the representative that my bike was not covered on the track at all. She was helpful and pointed me to the exclusions section in my policy that had this information. Not just the age old racing disclaimer either. My policy excluded any coverage for "temporary or permanent closed circuit courses" all written in cold insurance company boilerplate. I'm glad I know now and never had to make a claim. Does anyone have any experience with insurance companies that will insure a bike used for track days? It would be helpful as well if these companies were able to easily evaluate bikes that are well equipped with lots of "go fast" parts. This will help me in narrowing down the options for shopping for a new policy. Providers that also insure cars would be a plus as it just saves hassle when it's time to pay the bills. I'm considering converting this bike over to 100% track use and going with bodywork on it to keep my factory stuff out of harms way. If you had an RR equipped with a lot of HP race parts would you be willing to ride it at the track and self insure? The big one that's kept me from doing that already is theft. Hearing other people's experience and approach would be really helpful. If you ride your bike at the track I urge you to go right now and read the exclusions section of your policy. You might have to pull this up online as some companies don't send the full policies out to customers or you may have overlooked it when they did. Make sure your policy covers the bike on the track. Regardless of what you hear online policies vary from market to market and some of them contain some very limiting language regarding track coverage. Even if you have been "told" by your insurance agent they cover bikes on the track what's written in the policy will be the only thing used to define the coverage. Nobody likes insurance companies other than perhaps people who own them. I fully understand this and don't particularly care for them myself. I have intentionally left out the name of my insurance company to protect the names of the not so innocent. Lets keep this thread positive and only name companies that can help us enjoy our passions rather than the names of those who can't. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmckeen Posted January 9, 2016 Report Share Posted January 9, 2016 Robert, I think most every insurance company will exclude closed circuit and racing from their policy's, the only existing loop hole that I'm aware of is some insurance company's will waive the exclusion IF you attending a school, which CSS just so happens to be. There are company's that specifically offer insurance on race cars and bikes, but the premiums are INSANE !!! This is one of the big advantages to having a track only bike, you don't register or insure it at all, and just FYI should it be stolen out of the back of your transport vehicle, that is a claim on your homeowners insurance not your auto insurance. You also might wanna just double check the exclusions in your life insurance policy, they wont cover certain high risk activities either, I had a lengthy back and forth with Aflac regarding the wording in their boiler plate and how it applied to track days vs racing. In the end they changed the wording to "Racing as a professional" which cleared the issue right up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rchase Posted January 9, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 9, 2016 Super helpful reply there! I tend to self insure where I can as I'm not a big fan of having to negotiate just to get the bare minimum that will make me whole again. Some times you end up ahead in the long run not paying premiums and just eating the loss rather than having to go through the hoops of getting an insurer to pay. I do that with a few of my cars already. That might be the case on a dedicated track bike as well. Unless the bike tumbles most of the time the damage is just cosmetic or limited to the levers and pegs and other easily breakable bits. Even if you do end up with a tumbled and crumpled mess of a bike it's still worth "something" in parts. I have heard of cases of insurance companies totaling bikes for simple cosmetic damage which in the grand scheme of things makes the coverage slightly useless at the track anyway. I had not considered home owners covering theft of the bike for theft nor exclusion clauses in my life insurance. It sounds like I'm going to have to have a long chat with some insurance agents and see what I can find that suits my needs better than what I currently have. They probably aren't going to like it when I want copies of policies up front so I can read them before I'm willing to sign up for coverage. On the track day thing. Nearly 100% of the track days I have ever attended include "coaches" which can provide you education if you chose to work with them. While they aren't full schools a lot of people learn to ride at the track that way. I suppose that's the gray area that some insurers won't cover and some will. Market dependent of course. Like everything else in life. Insurance is complicated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khp Posted January 10, 2016 Report Share Posted January 10, 2016 I'm not in the US, but here goes: It's pretty simple for us: if the bike doesn't have a license plate, it can't get insured. And since registration tax is up to 180%, we don't register trackbikes. So the only choice is self-insurance. Including for theft. Some insurance companies even refuse to insure motorcycles beyond Third-Party (which is required by law). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spike Posted January 11, 2016 Report Share Posted January 11, 2016 You also might wanna just double check the exclusions in your life insurance policy, they wont cover certain high risk activities either, I had a lengthy back and forth with Aflac regarding the wording in their boiler plate and how it applied to track days vs racing. In the end they changed the wording to "Racing as a professional" which cleared the issue right up. Never thought of this. Definitely worth looking into. Thinking it might be a good idea to do a touch base in general with my insurance guy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rchase Posted January 11, 2016 Author Report Share Posted January 11, 2016 That's kind of interesting to see the way it's done in other parts of the world. Here in the USA we are required to have liability insurance if a bike is ridden on the roads. There's some weirdness depending on where you live with the ability to get a plate on the a bike in the future if you let the registration lapse for track use. More times than not when you decide to go back to the roads the local tag office will demand all of the back tag registration in order to issue a new tag. I plan to keep tags and insurance on all my bikes regardless of their "on road" status due to this. Being able to slap a plate on with tape and being able to kinda sorta legally do a quick road test if needed is kind of nice. They tend to impound you if you are completely unregistered and uninsured. No headlights and tail lights are another matter but usually either a warning or a ticket. Having a plate available that comes back to a valid insured bike in your name also tends to answer questions right away if there's ever a question of ownership. Not so much with them being able to just check the VIN number. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
khp Posted January 12, 2016 Report Share Posted January 12, 2016 I believe that liability = third party insurance. Mandatory here too. What happens if you ride your car/bike without registration? You get to pay full tax + a fine equal to the tax. That'll teach 'ya. And if you're living in Denmark, you are not allowed to ride a foreign registered car/bike (there are some very narrow exceptions). I like to test my bike on a dyno or at a trackday for that reason. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmckeen Posted January 15, 2016 Report Share Posted January 15, 2016 Rob, Does Georgia not have some version of "Planned Non Operational" registration status ? In California you register the vehicle as PNO and you don't have to carry insurance on it and there are no fees or penalties when you decide to return it to registered status. Its a one time thing, the DMV sends me a notice every year with what the cost to register the vehicle would be, but there are no annual fees. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaybird180 Posted August 25, 2016 Report Share Posted August 25, 2016 Larry Pegram used to have the name of an insurer emblazoned on his bike and they covered trackday bikes. Somehow I can't remember the name of the company but I remember all that- strange....LoL. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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