Pennsylvania Car Insurance: Stacking of Limits

When you insure more than one vehicle, you can maximize the coverage on your Uninsured Motorist and Underinsured Motorist coverage by stacking your benefits. It’s not required under Pennsylvania auto insurance law, but we recommend you stack the limits of your coverage to give you the best protection possible if you’re ever in an accident.

How Does Stacking Work?

If you have more than one vehicle on the same policy and choose to stack your coverage, your Uninsured/Underinsured Motorist coverage equals the sum of the coverage for all the vehicles.

For example, say you have two vehicles in your household on the same policy. Each vehicle has our minimum recommended Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist coverage ($100,000 per person, and $300,000 per occurrence), and you have “stacked” the limits. You would actually have $200,000 per person, and $600,000 per occurrence of coverage.

The cost for stacking of Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist coverage is relatively inexpensive. Not stacking your limits, or reducing your Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist coverage may save you some money, but it could also cost you thousands of dollars if you’re injured in a car accident.

Ask your insurance company representative about stacking your benefits to get the most coverage for your money. Remember, you can make changes to your policy at any time. All you need to do is contact your insurance agent.

An Example of How Stacking Can Save You Thousands

Say you’re seriously injured in a car accident, and the value of your case exceeds $200,000. However, the driver who caused the accident only has auto insurance with liability limits of $15,000. This driver is “underinsured.”

You have two cars covered on your own car insurance policy, and you’ve chosen to carry Underinsured Motorist coverage of $100,000 per person for each car with stacking. You now have $200,000 of Underinsured Motorist coverage available to you. The $200,000 of Underinsured Motorist coverage from your own auto insurance policy, plus the $15,000 from the at-fault driver’s liability coverage, would mean that you could potentially recover a total of $215,000.

However, if you did not elect to stack your Underinsured Motorist coverage, you would only receive $15,000 from the at-fault driver’s liability coverage, plus a maximum of $100,000 from your policy, equaling $115,000 for your total compensation. You would, therefore, receive $100,000 less than what you may otherwise have been entitled to receive.

Worse yet, if you had no Underinsured Motorist coverage on your car insurance policy, you would only be able to collect $15,000 from the at-fault driver’s liability coverage. In this case, you would lose $200,000 of potential compensation. That’s money out of your pocket that you may need – especially if you’re off work or require extensive treatment for your injuries.

Injured in an Accident? Need Legal Help?

Even if you’re a safe driver, sometimes there’s no way to prevent a car accident – especially when the other driver is at fault. It’s important to have enough Uninsured and Underinsured Motorist coverage, and stack the limits, to give yourself the best protection if you’re injured.

If you were hurt in a car accident, contact Edgar Snyder & Associates today for a free legal evaluation. You may have a car accident case.

Serious car accident injuries change lives forever. Our attorneys have helped thousands of people get the compensation they need to get their lives back on track. Don’t wait to contact us. Our phones answer 24/7.

Call 1-866-9-4EDGAR (1-866-943-3427), or fill out the form at the top right of this webpage to get started.