Method and system for dynamically changing automobile insurance

Abstract

A mobile device automatically determines the identity of a proximate automobile that has been activated, and further determines whether the automobile presently has active insurance coverage as one automobile of a multi-automobile policy. If the automobile has only base coverage, then the user is presented with a selection screen for activing coverage in order to comply with insurance requirements to operate the automobile on public roadways. Similarly, when the owner/user knows they will not be using the automobile for a long or indefinite period of time, then the active insurance can be turned off or transferred to another automobile on the multi-automobile policy.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A method for dynamically updating and verifying an active automobile designation for a multi-automobile insurance policy, comprising:
 accessing, by a mobile device, insurance information associated with an account maintained by an insurance company, the insurance information including a plurality of vehicle records associated with an insurance policy provided by the insurance company, wherein the plurality of vehicle records each include a data field indicating whether the corresponding vehicle is presently an actively covered vehicle or a base covered vehicle;   displaying, by the mobile device, a plurality of interface objects on a display of the mobile device, each one of the plurality of interface object corresponding to a respective one of the plurality of vehicle records;   receiving, at the mobile device, a selection of one of the plurality of interface objects, wherein the selection indicates that the vehicle corresponding to the selected one of the plurality of interface objects is to be an actively covered vehicle;   subsequent to receiving the selection, the mobile device automatically acquiring, by other than manual entry, an identifier of the vehicle;   the mobile device determining whether the received identifier corresponds to an actively covered vehicle associated with the insurance policy; and   the mobile device issuing a notification indicating whether, based on the identifier, the vehicle is actively covered.   
     
     
         2 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein automatically acquiring the identifier of the vehicle comprises connecting to a personal area wireless network transceiver of the vehicle. 
     
     
         3 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein acquiring the identifier comprises acquiring a media access controller address of the personal area wireless network transceiver as the identifier. 
     
     
         4 . The method of  claim 2 , wherein the personal area wireless network transceiver provides the identifier to the mobile device as a vehicle identification number. 
     
     
         5 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein automatically acquiring the identifier of the vehicle comprises the mobile device connecting to a telematics unit of the vehicle and receiving the identifier from the telematics unit. 
     
     
         6 . The method of  claim 5 , wherein the identifier provided by the telematics unit is a vehicle identification number of the vehicle. 
     
     
         7 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein automatically acquiring the identifier of the vehicle comprises connecting a personal area network transceiver that is connected to an on board diagnostic connector of the vehicle and receiving the identifier from the personal area network transceiver that is connected to an on board diagnostic connector. 
     
     
         8 . The method of  claim 1 , wherein automatically acquiring the identifier of the vehicle comprises performing an image recognition process on an image captured by the mobile device and recognizing the identifier in the image. 
     
     
         9 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein the image is an image of a license tag of the vehicle, recognizing the identifier in the image comprises recognizing a license tag number of the license tag. 
     
     
         10 . The method of  claim 8 , wherein the image is an image of a pictographic code associated with the vehicle, recognizing the identifier in the image comprises recognizing the pictographic code and decoding information from the pictographic code to obtain the identifier.