Is Umialik Good for Auto Insurance?
Last Updated on June 28, 2021
Umialik is an Alaska-based insurance company with 35 years of experience covering drivers, businesses, and homeowners across the state. The Anchorage-headquartered company sells insurance through independent insurance agents.
As one of Alaska’s largest and most popular homegrown insurance companies, Umialik aims to provide effective insurance products to policyholders with all different needs.
Is Umialik a good auto insurance company? Should you buy your Alaska car insurance through Umialik? Keep reading to discover everything you need to know about Umialik in our review.
Table of Contents:
- What Is Umialik?
- Umialik Insurance Products & Services
- How Does Umialik Auto Insurance Work?
- What Makes Umialik Unique?
- Umialik Auto Insurance Discounts
- Umialik Ratings & Reviews: What Do Customers Have to Say?
What Is Umialik?
Umialik Insurance Company has covered people and businesses across Alaska for over 35 years. The company works exclusively through independent insurance agents. You talk to an agent in your local community, and that agent works with you to find the best policies and products through Umialik.
Umialik Insurance Company is a member of the Western National Insurance Group, a collection of eight insurance companies serving regional communities across 19 states. As a subsidiary of Western National Insurance Group, Umialik offers the benefits of an Alaska-based company with the financial stability of a major insurer.
Western National Insurance Company is a Minnesota-based insurance company founded in 1900. Originally launched as the Mutual Creamery and Cheese Factory Fire Insurance Company of Minnesota, Western National Insurance Company purchased Umialik as part of a series of mergers and acquisitions between 2007 and 2016.
Today, Umialik operates with a mission “to act with integrity in the service of others,” according to Umialik.com. The company offers a wide range of insurance products and services to businesses, individuals, and families across Alaska.
Umialik Insurance Products & Services
Umialik insures thousands of policyholders across Alaska. You can buy personal insurance and commercial insurance through Umialik. The company aims to offer competitive prices while offering similar insurance products to other major insurers serving Alaska.
Some of the company’s largest insurance products include:
Personal Auto Insurance: Umialik offers personal auto insurance throughout the state of Alaska. You can buy coverage that meets or exceeds Alaska’s minimum liability insurance requirements. Drivers can also buy full coverage car insurance and other insurance options through Umialik.
Homeowner Insurance: Umialik offers several types of homeowners insurance, including insurance for renters, homeowners, condo owners, and more. Umialik also offers unique options like homeowner equipment breakdown coverage, which helps with repair and replacement costs for home equipment after it breaks down (including heating and air conditioning systems, dishwashers and other appliances, PCs and laptops, water heaters, ranges and ovens, lawn tractors, and more).
Personal Umbrella Insurance: Many Alaska residents buy personal umbrella insurance as an extra layer of coverage. Personal umbrella insurance adds an extra amount of liability coverage on top of your personal insurance policies. Umialik offers personal umbrella insurance with limits of $1 million or more. You must have both a personal auto policy and a homeowner policy from Umialik to buy the company’s personal umbrella insurance.
Dwelling Fire: Umialik offers dwelling fire insurance to help policyholders cover multiple dwellings that their homeowner insurance does not cover. Dwelling fire is ideal for those who own multiple properties. It can cover properties you rent to others or a seasonal property you own.
Business Insurance: Umialik offers a wide range of business insurance products and services, including a businessowners policy (BOP), commercial auto coverage, commercial fire coverage, commercial package policy (CPP), commercial umbrella coverage, contractors E&O, cyber liability, employer’s practices liability (EPL), equipment breakdown coverage, general liability coverage, inland marine insurance, and workers’ compensation coverage.
How Does Umialik Auto Insurance Work?
Umialik offers auto insurance policies similar to the policies provided by other insurers serving Alaska. Drivers can buy everything from minimum liability insurance to full coverage auto insurance through Umialik.
Here’s how Umialik’s auto insurance works for drivers in Alaska:
Liability Coverage: Drivers in Alaska can buy liability coverage to meet or exceed the state’s minimum requirements. Umialik’s liability coverage includes bodily injury liability coverage and property damage liability coverage.
Collision and Comprehensive Coverage: Collision and comprehensive coverage are two types of coverages available through Umialik as part of a full coverage car insurance policy. These coverages are optional in the state of Alaska (and all other states), but they provide additional protection for your vehicle from accidents, theft, vandalism, and more.
Rental Reimbursement Coverage: Umialik can cover the cost of renting a car if your ordinary vehicle is damaged or being repaired after a covered event.
Roadside Assistance Coverage: Umialik offers roadside assistance coverage to cover unexpected breakdowns, fuel deliveries, and other roadside service, up to a certain limit. You can add roadside assistance to your policy for a few extra dollars per month. Umialik also refers to this coverage as towing and labor coverage or Highway Emergency Loss Protection (HELP) coverage.
Auto Glass Coverage: Umialik offers auto glass coverage, allowing you to make a claim to repair or replace glass on your vehicle, including broken or chipped windshields. Umialik lets you add full glass coverage to your policy for a few extra dollars per month.
Auto Loan / Lease Gap Coverage: Umialik offers auto loan or lease coverage, also known as gap coverage. This coverage covers the difference in the value of your vehicle and the amount remaining on your loan or lease.
New Vehicle Replacement Cost Coverage: Umialik offers new vehicle replacement cost coverage. If your new vehicle is a total loss after an accident, then Umialik may pay for the cost of replacing that vehicle with a newer option.
Medical Payments and Personal Injury Protection Coverage: Alaska does not require drivers to carry medical payments coverage or personal injury protection (PIP) coverage. However, Umialik offers these coverages as an optional add-on, compensating you for medical bills and other expenses after an accident.
What Makes Umialik Unique?
Umialik has several features that distinguish it from other leading car insurance companies serving Alaska, including:
Alaska-Based: Umialik is headquartered in Anchorage and has served the state of Alaska for over 35 years. The company is one of the biggest Alaska-based insurance companies available to policyholders across the state.
Home, Auto, and Business Insurance: Umialik sells a range of insurance products to meet the needs of Alaska residents, including home, auto, and business insurance products. If you like the idea of all your insurance needs being under one roof, then Umialik may be the right choice for you.
Independent Agents: Umialik sells auto insurance through independent agents across the state. That means you buy car insurance from people in your community. These agents sell insurance products from several companies. If Umialik is the best choice for your unique needs, then the agent may recommend Umialik.
Penalty-Free Promise: Umialik offers a Penalty-Free Promise guarantee. It’s a unique program seen with few other insurers. With the Penalty-Free Promise system, Umialik guarantees you will never pay a higher rate as the result of accidents or violations. This program is identical to the No Surcharge Promise from Western National Insurance Company, Umialik’s parent company.
Backed by Larger Insurer: Some regional insurers have poor financial strength ratings because they face a higher risk of financial loss due to regional disasters. Although Umialik exclusively insures property in Alaska, the company is backed by Western National Insurance Company, a Minnesota-based insurer with an A+ (Superior) financial strength rating from A.M. Best.
Umialik Auto Insurance Discounts
Umialik offers customized discounts based on your unique needs. Contact your local agent to see if you qualify. Common Umialik car insurance discounts include:
Anti-Theft Device Discount: If your vehicle has active or passive anti-theft devices, then you may qualify for Umialik’s anti-theft device discount.
Common Loss Deductible Discount: If you have home and auto insurance with Umialik, then you only pay one deductible for the same incident across those two policies (say, if your home and car are both damaged in the same house fire).
Defensive Driving Discount: Drivers over 55 who have completed a defensive driving course may qualify for a discount of up to 10% through Umialik’s defensive driving discount.
Family Discount: Umialik’s family discount reduces the cost of car insurance if multiple family members at your residence have insurance with Umialik, even if they’re under different policies.
Good Student Discount: If you are a full-time high school, college, or university student under 25 years of age, then you could qualify for Umialik’s good student discount. You must be in the upper 20% of your class or maintain a ‘B’ average (a 3.0 on a 4.0 GPA grading scale) or better to qualify. This discount applies every year up to age 25, even after graduating.
Loyalty Discount: Umialik offers loyalty discounts to customers who continue to buy car insurance year after year. Umialik offers a discount of 2% on your first year renewal, with additional discounts each year. The discount maxes out at 10% on the policyholder’s ninth renewal year.
Multi-Car and Multi-Policy Discounts: If you have multiple insurance policies or insure multiple vehicles with Umialik, then you receive discounts across all policies and vehicles.
Umialik Ratings & Reviews: What Do Customers Have to Say?
Umialik is a subsidiary of Western National Insurance Group, giving the company better financial stability than many regional insurers. While other regional insurers are overly exposed to risk (like a bad winter in Alaska or a single hailstorm in Anchorage), Umialik has a strong financial position through its affiliation with A.M. Best.
A.M. Best has awarded the company an A+ (Superior) rating. The ratings organization analyzes insurers based on their assets and liabilities.
Umialik is a small company with few ratings or reviews online. J.D. Power and other ratings organizations, for example, have limited information about Umialik.
However, Umialik’s parent company has strong reviews online. The company has an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau, for example. Review aggregator website WalletHub has given the company an average rating of 3.3 stars out of 5 with 115+ customer reviews, while Clearsurance has a 4.3 star rating from 30+ reviews.
Final Word on Umialik
Umialik is an Anchorage, Alaska-based insurance company offering an extensive selection of products and services through independent agents across the state.
To learn more about Umialik or to request a quote today, contact an independent agent in your community.
| Umialik Insurance Company Contact Info | |
|---|---|
| Address | 725 E. Fireweed Lane, Suite 500 Anchorage, Alaska 99503 |
| Phone Number | (907) 338-5445 |
| Email Address | info@umialik.com |
| Hours | Monday to Friday - 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. AKT |
| Website URL | https://www.umialik.com/ |
