Louisiana Insurance (LA)

Louisiana Car Insurance Requirements
Under Louisiana law, you ought to carry liability coverage on any automobile you own. This coverage recompenses for property damages or personal injury for which you may be held responsible by law, up to your policy's dollar limits. In Louisiana, each vehicle has to have 10/20/10 liability limits. Those limits allow compensations of $10,000 for physical injury to one person, $20,000 for physical injury to more than one person in a single accident, and $10,000 coverage for damage to someone else's vehicle or other property.

Liability insurance covers physical injury or property damage caused by you, and others including your family members, driving your vehicle with your permission. You and your family members are covered also when driving another person's automobile as well as rental private passenger vehicles. Company cars and other non-owned cars commonly obtainable to you are not covered.

The Louisiana Automobile Insurance Plan permits companies to write auto liability insurance for persons who have been rejected on attempting to avail coverage through the usual channels. This guarantees the accessibility to insurance, to everyone licensed to drive in this state.

Louisiana law requires that all registered owners of an automobile carry liability insurance. Uninsured motorists are subject to such penalties as fines, restricted upturn of damages, and confiscation of the uninsured vehicle. On failing to provide proof of insurance, motorists run the risk of having their vehicles seized right away or have their license plates taken off and a yellow sticker affixed to the back windshield of the vehicle. The motorist is then allowed three days to present proof of insurance to the Office of Motor Vehicles. After three days, if the motorist is stopped again, the officer can take away his or her vehicle until proof of insurance is supplied and all pulling and restoration fees are paid. The fines vary from $75 to $100 on the first conviction, $100 to $250 on the second conviction and up to $700 on each conviction after that.

The Louisiana law known as "No Pay, No Play" forbids uninsured motorists from collecting the first $10,000 in property damages and the first $10,000 in personal injuries without any consideration to who causes the accident. This law also incorporates a provision that may consent to you relinquishing your right to make a legal claim for pain and suffering if you purchase economic-only uninsured motorist coverage.

How to contact the Louisiana Department of Insurance

The Poydras Building
1702 N. 3rd Street Web site:
Baton Rouge, LA 70804-9214

Toll Free: 1-800-259-5300
Baton Rouge: (225)342-0895

Car Thefts in Louisiana
Louisiana has witnessed a sustained decrease in the number of reported stolen vehicles for the past five years. The only year from 1999 to 2003 with an increase was 2001, when it rose 1.96 percent. In 1999 the number was 21,695, and in 2003, it was 19,882, an encouraging slump of 8.36 percent according to the FBI Uniform Crime Report.

Louisiana saw a 1.51 percent drop in the auto theft rate from 2002 to 2003 when the number of thefts lessened from 20,186 to 19,882, ranking Louisiana 24th in the country.

Louisiana ranked 16th in 2003 with a "thefts per 1,000 population" rate of 4.42. In 2002, the rate was marginally higher at 4.50.

Louisiana was ranked 21st in 2003 with 19,882 motor vehicles stolen.

The eight municipalities with the most motor vehicles reported stolen are: New Orleans, Shreveport, Bossier City, Baton Rouge, Monroe, Lake Charles, Lafayette, Alexandria and Houma.

The foremost problem area is New Orleans. In 2003, New Orleans was ranked 33rd among all cities in the United States, an advancement from the 27th and 17th rankings it registered in 2002 and 2001 respectively. In 2003, there were 8,969 thefts, a reduction of 3.13% from 9,259 the previous year. Though New Orleans has shown a stable decline in auto theft over the past few years, it still has the highest rate of auto theft in the state with 670.47 vehicles stolen per 100,000 people.

Shreveport-Bossier City is next, ranked 68th among all U.S. cities in 2003, with 492.28 thefts per 100,000 people. Shreveport registered 1,932 motor vehicles thefts that year, up from 1,427 two years earlier. This corresponded to the greatest rate of increase per 100,000 people of any area of the state.

Baton Rouge ranked 85th in 2003, registering 2,674 thefts, or 443.53 per 100,000 people.