Call the company to find out the status of their bankruptcy and of your insurance. If they are not able to help you, call the state insurance department. The state insurance department will know about the plans for rehabilitating or taking over your company. Usually, a healthy company will be assigned to take over your company and honor your policy. Eventually you should get a new policy with the acquiring company.

It is legal. The agent's premium is not final. The agent is often providing a "Quote" based on plugging the information that the consumer provides into a quoting system without verifying "accident & violation" information, credit score, and "claims" data. It's the insurance company's underwriters who make the final determination of the rate after evaluating all available information including: DMV, Claims and Credit Score to finalize the insurance premium.

You’ll probably lose this one. You are entitled to have your car restored as nearly as possible to its pre-wreck condition, but your insurance company can direct you to a shop it feels does good work and is cost efficient. You can ask them to use your mechanic. If it is important enough to you, you can even offer to pay the difference in price. Ultimately, you are at the mercy of the insurer. You will have a better chance convincing them if your shop of choice is not owned by a relative.

They are required to return the car to an equivalent of its pre-wreck condition. They will undoubtedly argue that the generic parts will do that in a cost-effective manner. If you can show that the generic parts are inferior to the factory-made parts, you should prevail. But this is a hotly contended issue. A number of consumer groups have pending lawsuits against insurers complaining that the generic, or after-market, parts are inherently inferior. The issue has yet to be resolved.

Insurance companies look at your credit record and your history of making insurance claims. Computer databases are used to check on your answers. The Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange, operated by Equifax, is the leading database for insurance claims. CLUE charges $8 for a copy of your report. If the report has been used as the basis for turning you down, you are entitled to a free copy. Call (800) 456-6004. The report will include instructions on how to fix errors on a CLUE report.

A driver who has had tickets, accidents or convictions for driving under the influence of alcohol might be considered a “high risk” driver. Also, young, relatively inexperienced drivers might be high risk. Add that label to drivers of sporty or “souped-up” cars. There are companies that insure these “substandard risks.” Some are independent companies. Others are associated with major insurers with similar names to the parent company.