As of noon on Thursday, Nov. 8,insurer State Farm have already reported receiving around 15,000 auto insurance claims from New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and other nearby states.

On State Farm’s list, New York had most of the auto claims having 8,337 filed while New Jersey followed with 3,631 claims. Pennsylvania also had 1,515, Maryland with 740, Virginia with 420 and Delaware with 149.

Another auto insurance giant, Progressive also reported late last week that they have already received more than 6,000 auto insurance claims as a result of the superstorm that hit the East Coast late October. Accordingly, more than half of those auto insurance claims are caused by flood damage while others are related to wind damage.
As for Progressive, 80 percent of their total claims post-Sandy are from the states of New York and New Jersey, while the other 10 percent is being shared by Pennsylvania and Connecticut.

On the other hand, Nationwide also reported that they have already received around 21,000 claims on Friday, Nov. 9, though a breakdown on auto-related claims is not yet available.

Though the Insurance Information Institute have not yet complied the total auto-related damage incurred from Sandy, insurance experts are seeing the total losses to be at almost $20 billion. Their latest estimate had put Sandy as one the most expensive hurricane in recent time. Hurricane Irene which struck the U.S. last year only brought over $4 billion insured losses.

In responding to auto insurance claims, many insurers have setup functional satellite offices in areas greatly affected by the storms to efficiently address consumers with claim concerns.

In times of disasters like this, auto insurance consumers will see the need of having not just the minimum required insurance coverage in their respective states which most requires liability coverage, as liability insurance does not cover for the damages incurred by their vehicles due to disasters. Damages caused by such events are to be covered by comprehensive coverage.