Analysis of Insurance Claims by Incident Types

This report examines vehicle incidents and claim amounts using insurance claims data.

Table 1

incident_type median_auto_year median_claim_amount median_age Totals
Multi-vehicle Collision 2006 61650 39 419
Parked Car 2005 5490 37 84
Single Vehicle Collision 2005 62640 38 403
Vehicle Theft 2005 5495 38 94

Table 1 shows that there are four incident types: multi-vehicle collision, parked car, single-vehicle collision, and vehicle theft. Multi-vehicle collisions have the highest number of incidents, followed by single-vehicle collisions. The incident type with the highest median claim amount is single-vehicle collisions. Two questions arise from the data for further explanation. First, median claim amounts are lower for multi-vehicle collisions than for single-vehicle. Since more cars are involved, one might expect multi-vehicle claims to be higher. Second, the median claim amount for vehicle theft seems low compared to the cost to replace a vehicle that is stolen.

Table 2

time_frame median_auto_year median_claim_amount median_age Totals
10:00a.m.-4:59p.m. 2005 61490 38 293
10:00p.m.-midnight 2006 62920 39 89
5:00p.m.-7:59p.m. 2005 60190 40 135
6:00a.m.-9:59a.m. 2005 40320 38 163
8:00p.m.-9:59p.m. 2005 60205 39 76
midnight-5:59a.m. 2005 52590 36 244

As shown in Table 2, the highest number of incident claims occurs between 10:00AM and 4:59PM, followed by midnight to 5:59AM. The fewest incidents occur between 8:00PM and 9:59PM. Median claim amounts exceed 61,000 for all time periods except midnight to 5:59AM and 6:00AM to 9:59AM. Further analysis should explore why median claim amounts are so much lower during 6:00AM to 9:59AM. Additional analysis could divide the time periods equally to make the data more comparable.

Table 3

time_frame incident_type median_auto_year median_claim_amount median_age Totals
10:00a.m.-4:59p.m. Multi-vehicle Collision 2007 60750 38 137
10:00a.m.-4:59p.m. Parked Car 2004 5900 40 7
10:00a.m.-4:59p.m. Single Vehicle Collision 2004 63700 39 138
10:00a.m.-4:59p.m. Vehicle Theft 2005 6820 40 11
10:00p.m.-midnight Multi-vehicle Collision 2008 64800 40 41
10:00p.m.-midnight Parked Car 2013 5700 41 3
10:00p.m.-midnight Single Vehicle Collision 2004 62640 37 45
5:00p.m.-7:59p.m. Multi-vehicle Collision 2005 61400 41 65
5:00p.m.-7:59p.m. Parked Car 2011 6490 37 5
5:00p.m.-7:59p.m. Single Vehicle Collision 2005 61110 41 62
5:00p.m.-7:59p.m. Vehicle Theft 2000 5100 28 3
6:00a.m.-9:59a.m. Multi-vehicle Collision 2004 64320 39 41
6:00a.m.-9:59a.m. Parked Car 2006 5830 39 34
6:00a.m.-9:59a.m. Single Vehicle Collision 2006 63685 38 46
6:00a.m.-9:59a.m. Vehicle Theft 2006 4975 38 42
8:00p.m.-9:59p.m. Multi-vehicle Collision 2005 61440 39 47
8:00p.m.-9:59p.m. Parked Car 2004 5005 32 2
8:00p.m.-9:59p.m. Single Vehicle Collision 2005 59355 38 22
8:00p.m.-9:59p.m. Vehicle Theft 2005 6500 35 5
midnight-5:59a.m. Multi-vehicle Collision 2006 61625 37 88
midnight-5:59a.m. Parked Car 2004 4900 34 33
midnight-5:59a.m. Single Vehicle Collision 2005 60185 36 90
midnight-5:59a.m. Vehicle Theft 2004 5220 39 33

Table 3 enables comparison of incident types within each time period. For all time periods, either multi- or single- vehicle collisions have the highest numbers of claims and highest median claim amounts. Surprisingly, there are no vehicle thefts between 10:00PM and midnight. Between 6:00AM and 9:59AM, the number of vehicle theft claims is higher than for multi-vehicle collisions.

Graph 1

In Graph 1, total claims by incident types and time of day are shown. As we saw in Table 2, the time of day with the most incident claims is 10:00AM to 4:59PM while the fewest occur between 8:00PM and 9:59PM. For all time periods except 6:00AM to 9:59AM, the number of multi- and single-vehicle incident claims is much higher than the numbers of parked car or vehicle theft claims. Two questions for further exploration are, (1) why incident claims are distributed somewhat evenly during 6:00AM to 9:59AM compared to the other time frames and (2) why there are no vehicle thefts from 10:00PM to midnight.

Graph 2

Graph 2 examines the proportion of claims that occur during each time period for each incident type. This shows which time of day the highest proportion of each type of incident occurs. The highest proportions of multi- and single-vehicle claims occur during 10:00AM to 4:59PM. The highest proportion of parked car and vehicle theft claims occur between 6:00AM and 9:59AM. The graph also reveals that the proportions of incident claims that occur during each time frame for multi- and single-vehicle are similar, and that the proportions are similar for parked car and vehicle theft claims.