If you really think about it, it is a scam.
You pay them and even if the thing you have it for happens, they’ll possibly deny you. If they don’t deny you, they’ll certainly raise your premiums.
I recently had a single car accident that was my fault and it cost a few thousand dollars to fix my car. Sure enough, the insurance company raised my premiums hugely. If I keep this insurance I will pay more than three times what it cost to fix my car over the next three years when a car accident is supposed to impact your premiums. What the hell is the point.
medical bills and such have been raised to such levels that without insurance you’d be absolutely fucked. therefore, insurance has turned into an extra form of tax that goes directly to rich people instead of the government and the customers have to beg the rich people (with their terrible policies for claims and snakey “business practices”) to get some help back, without guarantee.
When you file a claim, always switch insurance before the claim is satisfied. This way it’s not in the system for the new company to see. Old company still has to resolve the claim based on you having coverage with them on the date of the incident, and new company may very well never notice the filed claim after the fact.
Play their system against them as best you can
In principle requiring insurance is good. People are generally not great at allocating money to pay for freak disasters and the amount of money required to fix them is not evenly distributed. In many cases not having insurance means people going homeless or carless over expensive (but relatively minor in the grand scheme) accidents. Not to mention life insurance and paying out expenses for accidents where it’s your fault but you wouldn’t have enough money to pay.
It’s essentially a tax run by privatized companies that ensure a safety net for everyone. The issue is that the companies are perversely incentives to make a profit and deny the very claim you signed up for insurance for.
There are two kinds of problems in terms of insurance, ones that can never be avoided and ones that in theory can be. It’s unlikely but possible to buy and drive a car and never once get into an accident until the car is gone. It is impossible to drive a car without oil changes and tire replacement. Accidents are covered and the unavoidable is not.
The human body will require medical care. This is unavoidable. This is why it should not be left to private insurance.