For my age, I have had my fair share of speeding tickets. Luckily, traffic school has been available to me so that I can get rid of all of my demerits and thus, have the traffic ticket recording as a parking ticket for insurance purposes. In addition to having all of the demerits wiped off of my record, I have had to pay only a reduced fine and the cost of traffic school. Truthfully, I will gladly pay a small fine and the cost of traffic school to avoid having a traffic ticket reported to my insurance company.
Speeding tickets, and in fact just about any traffic ticket that is not a parking ticket, can seriously increase your insurance premiums every month for the next couple of years. The reason that your insurance rates go up when you receive a moving violation is because you are deemed to be a risky driver (for lack of a better term). Insurance companies do not like risky drivers because they have an increased propensity for getting into car accidents. As such, there is an increased chance that your insurance company will have to pay an accident victim for damages to his/her car and damages to his/her body (which includes medical bills and pain and suffering). Additionally, depending on the type of insurance you have, should you get into a car accident and the other party flees the scene, your insurance company may have to pay you for your damaged car and damaged body.
Insurance companies like receiving your money but do not like to pay out money. As such, every time you do something that increases the insurance company’s chance of having to pay money, you are penalized by way of increased insurance premiums. The mentality is that if the insurance company can collect enough “extra” money from you, it will not sustain such a loss in the event that it has to pay out on your behalf or because of your negligence.
As stated above, speeding tickets are not the only thing that will raise your insurance premiums. Any moving violation (and there are many) that you obtain and that is reported to your insurance company will increase your premiums. Therefore, should you get a ticket for a moving violation you should see if traffic school will be sufficient to remove all of the demerits you received from the ticket. It traffic school is sufficient (depending on your state’s point or demerit system for moving violations, traffic school will only remove a certain number of points or demerits, and therefore, if you receive a ticket for a “serious” event, traffic school may not remove all of your points or demerits and thus, you insurance company will receive a report of such remaining points or demerits), you should participate in the same in order to avoid having to pay increased premiums.
The most obvious way to avoid traffic tickets is to drive carefully and obey the law at all times. However, should you be in a situation where you get a traffic ticket, attend traffic school, if sufficient, in order to avoid insurance premium rate hikes.