Your credit score can impact insurance bill

Tips from Sally Deneen.

Your credit score affects how much you pay for car insurance, but the question is by how much?

As an experiment, WalletHub.com sought price quotes from a handful of insurance companies, state by state.

They requested prices for two hypothetical 37-year-old single males who commute 20 miles each way to work in a 2009 Honda Accord LX and want minimal coverage. They’re identical men except for one thing — one has no credit, while the other has excellent credit.

In Florida, the hypothetical guy with no credit was quoted a 23 percent higher price for car insurance than the guy with excellent credit, WalletHub found.

On the bright side, Florida beat the national average of a 49 percent price difference. Connecticut had the smallest price difference among the two hypothetical guys, at 15 percent. Michigan had the largest difference, at 115 percent.

“The fact that credit scores impact insurance premiums to a significant extent should be the main takeaway for consumers rather than the exact amount of the impact,” says the study. (You can see it at Bit.ly/insurancecar).

Free credit score: You may be able to learn your FICO credit score for free from your credit card company. Discover card prints credit scores on customers’ monthly invoices. Citi and Barclaycard, among others, require credit card customers to log onto the bank websites to get access to free credit scores. See a chart on “Where to Get a FICO Credit Score” at Bit.ly/wherefico.

Freebies: Here’s another way to get a rebate form for a can of WD-40 Specialist product for free after rebate (valued up to $11.99): Bit.ly/ wdrebate. Thanks to the alert readers who said the previously mentioned link didn’t work for them.

If you shop at Sephora. com or Vitacost.com anyway, search for “free samples” at the latter or click on “free samples” at Sephora to choose complimentary samples to add to your purchase before you check out.

Cutting Corners appears Sundays in Community News. Email cutcorner@ aol.com or record a message at 954-356-4759.