Insurance Agency Tips for Teen Drivers

Teen Driver

5/27/08

Parents Need All the Help They Can Get When Kids Take the Wheel

Thank goodness the wellspring of information we’re inundated with as pregnant women and parents of babies doesn’t lessen as our kids get older. Scan the parenting section of a bookstore and your mind will be blown. Advice from doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists, nurses, counselors, girlfriends, baby whisperers and ministers leaps out. Each book is like a paper-bound Arnold Horshack wanting to answer our parenting questions: “Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh!”

Among our many information-gathering resources are insurance companies helping guide parents when it comes to teen drivers. Allstate has a great interactive Teen Driving Contract that helps you figure out some good family rules of the road. It even provides space to include consequences when those rules are broken. The company also provides incentive programs for good driving, as well as Accident Forgiveness. I can only assume that refers to a program where your teen and his or her car go to Vehicular Confession and are given several Hail Chevys and Our Fords for penance.

Other insurance companies offer similar help. American Family Insurance (is that song in your head now?) has a Teen Safe Driver program that places what is essentially a video camera in your teen’s car. Erratic vehicle movements, like extreme braking, acceleration or cornering, trigger the camera to start filming. If something happens, the 10 seconds before and after the “event” — that’s accident to you and me — are recorded and your teen is either busted or vindicated, in which case they’d likely be quite happy that evidence of their doing something right has FINALLY been caught on camera.

These companies aren’t the only ones looking out for families, so if you’re looking for help for yourself and your teen, try checking out your insurance company’s website. It may be much more valuable than the Horshacks at the bookstore.