This whole fucking mess I’m in with my auto insurance company is just getting too goddamn confusing for words.

Allow me to explain in great, nauseatingly gory detail. Back in late April/early May I knew my renewal for my auto insurance policy was coming up PDQ, because I’d just paid for my 2006 registration, and Dita – yes, I named my car – had just turned one year old. Now the strange thing is I never heard a word about it from AIC – my nickname for my evil insurers – and it struck me that I should likely be getting something in the mail about it.

And now, a word about the mail delivery where I live: it’s fucked. I wish I could explain why, but it’s one of those things that defies explanation, like Warner Brothers thinking Dukes of Hazzard needed the big-screen treatment (with a non-brunette Daisy, no less). Every once in a while my mail carrier doesn’t like delivering my mail to me and it either goes into the great white void and never returns, or it gets returned to the sender. This has happened periodically – it’s not like it’s frequent, so I don’t complain. I suspect that it has something to do with the changing of my last name, but everything has always gotten to me eventually so I had no reason to suspect that AIC’s renewal notices wouldn’t get to me…

…except they didn’t, so I kept calling their customer service number to find out what I should do.

“It’ll come to you by mail, don’t worry,� is what I was told three times. And then what came to me by mail in early June was a notice that said I owed $38.95 on my previous policy, and that it had expired. I nearly shit a brick. Expired? Say it ain’t so. I called the customer service number again and explained the letter I’d received. The dude on the other end said not to worry, I had a grace period. All I had to do is go into my local office and pay off the balance owing plus the amount of $309.09 to put the renewal into activation and everything would be okay. So a week later when I found the time to breathe I did exactly that, except the girl at the counter where I paid told me it wasn’t $309 to renew, it was $261. This made me happy. I wrote out a check, asked her if my new insurance card would come in the mail – she said it would – and went on my way.

And then…

It all happened so goddamn fast.

It’s the evening of July 1st.

I’m driving to Dr. Troy’s house.

This dude is tailgating me.

I’m watching him in the rear-view mirror as his headlights repeatedly disappear up my ass.

I mutter some epithets under my breath.

I look forward.

The light turns yellow.

To avoid being rear-ended, I decide to go for it.

As I go for it, the car heading the opposite direction of me turns left in front of me.

I slam on my breaks and swerve.

He speeds up.

I clip his back bumper, thankfully not too hard, and immediately pull over to grab my insurance information and make sure the other people are okay.

They are.

Damage is minor.

We exchange phone numbers and insurance information and head on our respective ways.

Five minutes later, safely at my destination, I called AIC to report what happened. A few days later a claims adjuster called to take my statement, which she recorded, and I told her what I thought had happened – that I ran a yellow, they turned too soon, I clipped their bumper, etcetera. As it was a photo enforced intersection she asked me if I’d seen the cameras flash, and I told her I hadn’t. “I’m pretty sure I didn’t run a red light, but if I get a notice in the mail saying I did, then I guess I did. But I don’t recall any cameras going off,� I said.

This is when she told me that my policy was showing as expired.

“I’m sorry?� I asked, completely flabbergasted.

“Yes, it shows that your policy expired on June 8th,� she said.

“That can’t be. I went into the office to pay for it to be renewed, and they cashed my checks for it a few days later.�

“Okay… can I record that information so we can use it in our investigation?�

I agree. She asks me to restate what I said, which I do. Then I ask her what procedure is, because that’s freaking me out. I mean, how can they take my money for renewal and then not renew me?

“Well, we have to do an investigation to figure out what happened. I mean, I can’t see why they wouldn’t insure you if they cashed your checks, but until they investigate I can’t promise you anything. So don’t worry about it for now, okay?�

Yeah, sure. Okay.

Fast forward a week or so later, when I get a notice in the mail from the police department. With pictures of me in my car. Running the red light.

Shit. It was red.

And what’s more, somewhere in between me watching Captain Rush Rush and looking up to watch the light turn yellow, he switched lanes. So there was nobody behind me. So there was no longer any reason for me to run the light. So I look like a giant jackass.

Okay, I fucked up. I made a mistake, I can admit that. So I immediately call the claims adjuster to let her know that I blew it and there was photographic evidence, and I accept responsibility for it. Interestingly, her previously helpful tone transformed into a short, snappy one that couldn’t wait to get me off the phone.

A week later – and not coincidentally, I’m guessing – I got a letter in the mail stating that my claim was going to be denied because I hadn’t filled out a questionnaire they’d sent me in the mail. Despite the fact that I never got the fucking questionnaire (with the exception of the one they included in their denial letter), and called them several times to tell them that fact, which was part of the angry message I left on the investigator’s voicemail. He called me back after the weekend and we ran in circles like dogs trying to sniff each others’ butts:

“Your policy expired because you didn’t fill out the questionnaire.�

“Okay, but what I’m telling you is I never got the questionnaire, so how am I supposed to fill it out?�

“Do we have your correct address on file?�

“Yes, but sometimes my mail gets messed up.�

“Okay, well, according to our records we sent you the questionnaire and you never sent it back, so we have to trust the US postal service.�

“That’s fantastic, but I called your call center several times to let them know that despite the fact that I was supposedly getting it in the mail, I wasn’t getting it in the mail. Which is why they told me to go into an office and pay that fee anyway. Which I did. And nobody mentioned the questionnaire to me there, either.�

“Well, we can’t renew your policy without the questionnaire, and we sent it to you and you didn’t fill it out.�

“Irregardless of the stupid questionnaire, the fact remains that you took my check for renewal and cashed it nearly two full weeks before the accident.�

Pause. “Where did this happen?�

I recount the entire ordeal once again.

“I’ll call that office and get back to you.�

I decided to do the same, and spoke with the manager there to recount the issue at hand thus far. She commits to doing an investigation of it, but in the meantime, can I fill out the questionnaire and send it to her so they can now reinstate my insurance?

Fucking questionnaire, I think, but instead I tell her that yes, I’ll do so.

And I do. And she calls me back.

“Okay, it seems that the $261 that you paid was for a balance owing,� she says.

What!? “No, my balance owing was for $38. I have it here in the notice I received in the mail.�

“Well, according to our records the balance was $261.�

“So then why wasn’t that explained to me when I went into your office and told your help desk that I wanted to pay for renewal of my policy? The balance owing I had was in a letter sent to me, that I actually did receive this time, and it clearly says $38. Never once have I received anything telling me that I owed $261.�

Pause. “We’ll have to investigate this and get back to you.�

Of course.

Meanwhile, I decided to call the customer service number again and talk to someone about what my account actually says, considering everybody else just wants to investigate and not explain to me what the hell is going on outside of “You didn’t fill out the questionnaire.� I speak with a nice, helpful man who works in their Texas office and – once again – tell him everything that’s happened so far. Then he says something that’s music to my ears:

“According to what I see here, it shows your insurance was carried over from June 05 to June 06 based on the payments you made June 17th. The system shows your payments were accepted.�

Gotcha bitch! I’m thinking, but instead I get his name and thank him profusely.

An hour later, the investigator calls back to tell me once again that they’re denying my claim because I didn’t fill out the fucking questionnaire, except now there’s a new twist to the story: as the other manager said, the $261 that I paid wasn’t for renewal, it was for a balance owing. So sorry, they’re still going to deny my claim.

Never mind that – regardless of any mailed notices, which once again did not come to me about this amount – if I’d have been told that when I went in to renew my insurance, as I very clearly told everyone at that office that I was there to do exactly that, obviously I would’ve done what was necessary to ensure that not only was my balance was cleared, but that my insurance was renewed. But no. I went to the girl and showed her the letter I’d received, I told her what I was told on the customer service line about the $309, she told me it was lower than I thought, I paid her, and she smiled and told me to have a nice day when I left. The end.

I gleefully called the investigator to leave a curt message about what I’d been told by the customer service operator and that he’d be hearing from both the Department of Insurance, with whom I’d filed a grievance, and from my lawyer.

I call the nice boy from Texas back again and tell him that although I know he can’t do anything, he’s been nice enough to explain my account to me, so would he be willing to help me once again?

He would, and he tells me some fabulous information:

I overpaid my insurance for June 04 to June 05, and they actually sent me a notice to tell me the balance would be carried over to the June 05 to June 06 year.

Huzzah!

Also very interesting: despite the fact that I overpaid, AIC actually cancelled my insurance for one day due to non payment!

Non-payment? Even though I had them on automatic bill pay through my bank and they cashed every check I sent them? Even though I overpaid for that year?!

You don’t say!

Could it be that maybe – just maybe – AIC fucked up a little? Maybe?

Because the manager at the office I went to wasn’t ragingly evil with me, I called her back and left her a message asking why I wasn’t sent a notice about the $261 balance – or was I? – and why this wasn’t explained to me when I went into her office, plus, how they could reinstate my insurance with the questionnaire I just faxed her but no money down on it? By the way, what happens to mail that gets returned to the sender?

And once again the investigator sent me another letter telling me that they investigated the same shit and came up with the same shit, and as such, I can suck shit because they ain’t covering the accident.

But it gets better. A week later I get my new renewal information in the mail and it seems I don’t have to pay anything for August. Why?

Well, I have a credit on my account.

In the amount of $261.

But… wasn’t that because I had a balance due on the old account?

Hmmmm….

So I call the manager at the office again and recount this to her, as well as the investigator, because what the hell – I’ve got time to kill before the Department of Insurance takes over. She later returned my call and said – in addition to acknowledging that I did, indeed, overpay my insurance for last year – she was attempting to investigate it, and said that she felt there was more they should've done to help me. Y’think? She was also investigating why the customer service operator didn't explain to me that I needed to fill out the questionnaire, but was at a loss to explain why that wasn't explained to me when I physically went into their office to pay for renewal, face to face, in person.

Oh, and did I mention that the new policy listed the renewal as effective at 12:01am June 8/05? Sure, it came with a letter saying it wasn’t going to be honored… but then why does the card say I’m insured for that time if I’m not? And why was my June 17th payment applied to the new policy? Better yet, I received a notice from my car company stating that AIC had notified them that my policy was cancelled as of June 20th, 2005. This is 12 days after they claimed to me they cancelled my coverage, and also three days after I went into the office to pay for the renewal.

I then got two notices in the mail: one contradicting my policy renewal, saying that I did owe money for the August 18th deadline, another telling me to disregard any cancellation notices -- which I never received anyway -- and that my policy was in effect from August 2 (which contradicts the paperwork I got saying it's in effect from June 8th).

So I attempted to point out all these discrepancies to the investigator who likes to send me stuff in the mail in a final attempt to work all this out without getting you involved, and he continually repeated the caveat that they canceled me because they didn't get a questionnaire. But if they don't know what's going on – which, by all these notices and variances in responses, it’s clear that they don’t – how am I supposed to know? Investigator drone also claimed he never made mention of the supposed balance owing being a factor in the decision, but I have his letter of August 2 proving so.

Can you say “Big, massive clusterfuck,� kids? I knew you could.

That’s enough of that for now. Today I have a meeting, a chiropractor appointment, a date with a treadmill, and I have to finish calling about 30 bars/restaurants/lounges for an article I’ve been assigned.