In a continuation of the encouraging trend of personal insurers embracing innovation as a way to deal with the increased popularity of “sharing economy” services, auto insurance giant Geico has announced it will be rolling out a new product in Virginia to cover ridesharing drivers for services like Uber, Lyft and Sidecar.

What’s more, the product goes significantly further than those previously announced by Farmers and USAA in Colorado and by National General Assurance Co.’s Metromile in California. Those products are designed to enhance personal auto policies with supplementary coverage for when a driver is logged on to a transportation network company’s smartphone application, but is neither in transit with a passenger nor en route to pick one up (the so-called “Period 1”).

The Geico product, which will be offered through its commercial auto insurance arm, is instead designed as a full end-to-end solution, providing coverage regardless of whether the driver is logged into a TNC app, regardless of whether he or she is transporting a passenger and regardless of which or how many TNCs the driver is signed up with. Geico Regional Vice President Nancy Pierce said in the press release announcing the product:

This product will offer ridesharing drivers a complete solution so they will never have to worry about how to report a claim, and if they chose the coverage, whether their car will be fixed and whether they’ll have medical coverage. Not only does the product provide full coverage at an affordable price, but also peace of mind.

One of the problems the industry has faced with bringing this sort of hybrid product to market is that the cost of commercial coverage for taxi and livery services has been far out of reach of the average driver. As I outlined in a paper R Street published in October 2014, rates for taxi drivers can run in the range of $8,000 to $10,000 annually. But Geico’s product aims to be far more affordable than that. As the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports:

A quote requested for a 2008 Honda Accord, with injury coverage of $100,000 per person and $300,000 per accident, would cost just more than $1,000 per year. The quote assumed a clean driving record, with no accidents or tickets in the past three years.

As a point of comparison, 2012 data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners shows the average annual expenditure for auto insurance in Virginia was $691.80. Thus, the enhanced Geico product would cost roughly an additional $25 a month.

The importance of an affordable product cannot be overstated, given pending rules winding their way through the commonwealth’s General Assembly that would put the onus to procure coverage almost entirely on the TNCs, rather than the drivers.

In a 67-28 tally, the House of Delegates voted Jan. 30 to approve regulations that require the TNCs to provide $1 million of liability coverage from the moment a trip request is accepted until the passenger exits the vehicle. Starting in 2016, the companies also will have to cover “Period 1,” but at the lower minimum liability levels of $50,000 per person, $100,000 per accident and $25,000 for physical damage.

Similar rules to legalize and regulate TNC services also passed the state Senate earlier in January by a 37-0 margin, marking a radical shift from just a few months ago, when the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles on Thursday furnished both Uber and Lyft with letters demanding they cease and desist operations within the commonwealth.

The House and Senate bills do still need to be reconciled, as each would impose slightly different licensing fees on TNC services. The House measure calls for an upfront fee of $70,000, plus an annual $3,000 renewal fee. The Senate bill, by contrast, would impose just a flat one-time $100,000 fee. The Virginia Department of Planning purports the fees are necessary to cover the cost of regulating the TNCs, which it estimates at $640,000 for the first year and $440,000 thereafter.

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