Should you pay monthly or annually for your car insurance premium

There are many insurance companies that offer a flexible payment option of annual or monthly premium payment for your car insurance. There are some companies that give you the choice of making a quarterly payment or a biannual payment. A monthly payment of premium spreads the premium cost of the car over the year. By spreading the annual insurance bill across twelve months, it becomes quite easy to pay premium while still getting all the protection you require for you and your motor vehicle.

However, with a monthly payment of premiums, you end up paying more, sometimes to the tune of 10% extra as compared to your monthly bill, because most insurance companies charge a kind of penalty if you are going to make your payment monthly spread over the next 12 months rather than annually at the beginning of the year to which the policy pertains. If your payment is on annual basis, then you also lose interest on the payment that you are making at the beginning of the insurance period as compared to the monthly payment where your money keeps on earning interest throughout the year. In most cases, there is an overall saving though if you pay annually, but for many people, the benefit of paying in easy monthly installments outweighs the saving due to annual premium. You should always keep in mind that even if there is a small saving, in the long run, a small amount of savings due to annual payment of premium may convert into a substantially large amount in a few years. For people, who are living financially lean lifestyles, a monthly payment of premium could be an effective means to make their outgo on car insurance premium a little more manageable.

Due to increased competition in the insurance companies segment, there are some companies that do not charge anything extra for monthly payments in which case, making a monthly payment could be an ideal choice. This is quite prevalent in some countries such as United Kingdom, and is being followed by some companies in Australia as well of late. Then, there are some credit card companies as well having a 0% plan for purchases for 12 months. It is always advisable to work out the implied insurance cost by calculating the extra payment made on monthly payment options and the money that you would be saving in the annual payment options before you come to a decision.