Police Check Auto Insurance

One more way that the police could soon be making our roads safer is to have mandatory roadside auto insurance checks. When the police pull someone over for an infraction of any kind, they run the driver’s license through the computer to find out if there are any arrests or warrants that they should know about.

Well, in Alabama, they are looking to add another layer to that check by having the police run a car insurance check while they are at it. They would be able to run a check on whether or not they have car insurance and these spot checks would make it all that much safer for other drivers on the road.

There has been a small group of Alabama agents that have been trying to get the measure passed for about two years now. They met with Governor Bob Riley just last week to try and work out how the electronic verification would work out and when they might be able to get it started once approved.

They say that when people get car insurance now, they can get the ID card and then stop paying on the car insurance policy. They still have the card, and when the police stop them there is no way to know whether or not that is actually a valid card. If it was computerized, they would be able to run it through the computer to see if it was.

They would also be able to check on car registrations, license tags, as well as insurance policy numbers. Some are against the idea however, for they feel that if the system went into affect, there would be all kinds of problems with it. Those that have car insurance say that the computers would be behind all of the time, and there would be the regular bureaucratic problems to deal with. They say they would end up being penalized for the state trying to keep track of those that don’t comply.

Back to May 07 Archives