

Auto Insurance Comparison Startup Leaky Launches Nationally, Raises $670K - jasontraff
http://techcrunch.com/2012/12/05/leaky-national-launch-seed-funding/

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JimA
Tried it and the lowest priced company it showed had a rate that was ~$250
cheaper than the actual quote I could get on the insurers web site. Plus my
current company (Safeco) wasn't in the comparison list, which means the
cheapest company (for me) isn't shown.

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Nursie
Not being in the US I'm not going to try it, but does this not work like the
UK ones, where that's a real actual price and you click straight through to
buying with the company at that quote?

\--EDIT-- no I see that it does not work like this, now that I've read more
about it, it predicts rates. Here's hoping they can actually integrate with
insurers in future because the services like that here in the UK are pretty
useful.

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ismarc
This has the exact same issue that nearly all insurance companies seem to have
and is the reason I'm with my current insurance company.

I have a 1978 Datsun/Nissan 280Z. Only one insurance company allowed an
online/unattended quote for insuring that age car. Only one other company was
able to give a quote after talking with them on the phone, all of the others
didn't have the ability to do a quote, even for liability only insurance. I
went in person to several places and the result was the same. The company that
allowed me to get a quote online now has all my other insurance related
business (renters/property/full coverage on my new car/etc.). It just so
happens that they've been an amazing company to work with, particularly when
we've had car related issues (getting rear-ended while stopped at a stoplight,
hitting an animal in the middle of the night when there was no room to
swerve/stop and rendering the vehicle undrivable, etc.).

Trying to go through the process to see what things are like, the list of
makes of cars is an abomination. It tries to filter based on years the make
was available, but isn't inclusive (Nissan starts at ~85, but Datsun doesn't
exist for older dates, etc.) and ends up being an incomplete list for a large
number of years (I sampled the most recent ~5 years and the oldest ~5 years
and several major manufacturers are missing) as well as model of cars being
incomplete for at least a few makes from those years as well.

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objclxt
There are _lots_ of UI problems involved with car insurance - some are (in my
opinion) actually fairly interesting. In established comparison markets
outside the US the big players invest a lot of money in getting the user
experience right so that users complete the process (there is a large drop-
off).

By far the easiest way to solve this is to do a registration plate lookup:
however, I don't know if this is even possible in the US, and it would be on a
state-by-state level so a bit of a nightmare. In countries like the UK, where
there is a single source of plates that companies can buy access to, it's a
lot easier.

Leaky could probably learn a far bit from how insurance quotation engines in
the EU and other less complex markets handle this. Here in the UK there are
many well established players doing what Leaky do, probably with more success
(which is totally down to the fact the UK insurance market is much more
centralised).

~~~
ismarc
Registration plate lookup would be a chicken/egg problem here in the States.
You need proof of insurance in order to get your registration, so on a vehicle
that has no plates, there's no number to give, so wouldn't be able to get
insurance. VIN is really the way to handle it, and once you get through the
"quote" stage to actually buying it, all the insurance companies can take any
VIN (and your info, of course) and spit out how much it actually costs. On a
state by state level, I don't imagine it would be difficult to build a system
to accurately compare rates. The fact that each state has its own system of
minimum requirements, as well as what can be covered, and insurance companies
are isolated to a single state (the larger insurance providers are actually
corporations with wholly owned subsidiaries in each state) increase this
complexity when dealt with on a national level. It's extremely similar to the
issues with comparing health insurance plans.

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kamjam
Welcome to doing something that has been done in Europe for many years now,
and not just on auto-isnurance:

<http://www.confused.com/>

<http://www.comparethemarket.com/>

<http://www.moneysupermarket.com/car-insurance/>

to name a few...

I understand that this was a legal issue due to the insurers (but even so,
they only launched a year ago...) but what is it with American companies that
they just don't seem to _get_ the internet?

Comparing price of auto-insurance is really no different than comparing the
price of flights, travel insurance, cars, houses, whatever. It's a
product/service and it is not going to be one size fits all. Some insurance
companies will be a better fit in terms of price and options available, so
insurance companies that are competitive will actually get _more_ customers by
being on the comparison sites.

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kpommerenke
There are legal reasons why the U.S. doesn't have true comparison sites,
unlike the UK. Screen-scraping is illegal here, but not in the UK, so you need
the cooperation of the carrier to show their quotes.

Most U.S. carriers don't cooperate with independent comparison sites, since
they don't want to see their product commoditized.

~~~
Jach
It's not illegal, but it's not very strongly settled one way or another.
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_scraping#Legal_issues>

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graffitishark
This is a great, much-needed product. I picked Progressive years ago because
it seemed like the easiest onboarding process (and I'm lazy) -- I just didn't
want to deal with the hassles of comparison shopping and negotiation. That
said, I had no idea how bad I was getting ripped off until just now. Anyway,
congrats on the launch. You can consider me a new, happy Leaky customer.

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Aloisius
I plugged in my current policy (as close as I could get it) into Leaky and it
got reasonably close. I have a custom policy ($200 deductible for
comprehensive and $500 for collision) and higher than normal coverage for BI
and Uninsured ($100k/$300k).

Leaky told me that Geico's 6 month for a policy very similar to mine would be
$681. It is actually $516, but it correctly stated that Geico was the cheapest
(which it was as of a month ago when I compared them manually).

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cloudwalking
Instead of an insurance comparison service, these guys should start an actual
auto insurance company.

Nobody likes insurance companies, so there's certainly a market for an
insurance company that people love.

Be ambitious. Build something big. Comparison sites are not a big or ambitious
idea. Comparison sites are a feature of bigger platforms. If you're building a
platform, call it that. Otherwise, build something bigger.

~~~
schrodinger
Agreed. I thought that's what it was at first, and I got really excited :)

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cloudwalking
Me too! :(

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csmatt
One tip for them would be to allow a user to upload driving record and
insurance coverage information from the company a user is currently with.

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yellow
My first thought is that companies would not want to forward data to a company
that enables a current customer to possibly leave for better rates.

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josephjrobison
It might be boring, but affiliates make a killing with auto insurance. Just
like Mint did with banks and credit cards. Killing.

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anywherenotes
Is there a place where I can compare car-insurance + house insurance + any
other insurance among companies?

Most companies give discounts on bundling few types of insurances, and so it
would be great if entire price could be compared. I am under impression that
not all insurance companies provide full coverage for what people need, so
just because car insurance is lower, total price may increase if you split the
needs across few companies.

~~~
jasontraff
I don't think it's currently possible to do entirely online at the moment.
Your best chance would be with an independent agent at the moment (though
we're trying to change that).

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csmatt
I like that they'll monitor the profile and alert if a price drops. Even if
they don't have the lowest on there, it's a good trigger for me to shop around
again.

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bdavisx
There's no way this is accurate for all locations. Some algorithms for
insurance calculations are proprietary trade secrets and only the general
information about them is filed with the states (not true for all states, but
for many it is).

In other words, just going from the State filings is not going to take into
account a lot of details that insurance companies are using to calculate your
premium.

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debacle
It depends on the state. If your state has crappy regulations, then you're
probably right.

If you're in NY, CA, or MA, you're probably in good shape as those states have
strong regulations.

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webjprgm
Can we get congress, or at least state congresses one by one, to pass a law
that says, rather than filing their rates, they must provide a web API for
accessing them. That would make the records much more accessible to everyone
and solve this comparison accuracy problem. It is definitely in the interests
of the consumers.

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kirpekar
Tried it, but the prices were no better than what I currently pay. Also the UI
is horrible.

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mkhalil
What language is the backend in?

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joering2
Its interesting to see YC going after such a risky ideas. Perhaps its just a
sign of huge cohones, which is good, or maybe just a pure desperation? I mean,
they hit jackpot with AirBNB and decided to invested, despite the fact the co-
founder was or still is on FBI scamers list [1] and he ran his scheme off of
government servers that you and I had to paid for in tax-dollars.

But aside this, I get the deception here that they don't get pricing directly
from Geico, but rather they calculate the price per Geico per State (if that
is really true, because what stops them from harvesting the data off of a
carrier website anyways and switch algorithm just in case they get subpoena or
something - can you see a similar pattern of questionable legality of business
practices with AirBNB?).

But the issue remains: what stops Geico from requesting their name to be
removed from said website? After all, Geico is a protected trademark, and if
Geico can prove that this website was providing incorrect information in
regards to their rates, then they can claim that said misleading information
is harming their business. To me, its a straightforward quick court case.

[1] [http://gawker.com/5853754/the-seedy-spammy-past-of-
airbnbs-c...](http://gawker.com/5853754/the-seedy-spammy-past-of-airbnbs-
co+founder)

Side note: its really sad to think YC would go after such a business idea.
Whats next? YC-founded youporn version 2.0??

EDIT: I never treated hackernews as a popularity contest. I always stay behind
my word even if it may hurt someones feelings. I knew I will get heavily
downvoted (which is fine) since YC is investing into this idea, but perhaps
when you do so, maybe you can point out where I am being wrong, instead of
just clicking down-arrow. That's kind of covardishy, if you ask me. :)

~~~
sp332
Trademarks are primarily to protect consumers, not companies. As long as you
are referring to Geico, and not trying to name some _other_ company "Geico",
you cannot fall afoul of their trademark. The trademark is to make sure that
you are referring to the right company, and that's all.

