Car Insurance After an At-Fault Accident

When you're at fault in an accident, your insurance company considers you a higher risk. In Texas, this typically translates to a premium increase of 20-50% at your next renewal (NAIC Auto Insurance Report). The exact increase depends on the severity of the accident, the amount of the claim, your prior driving history, and your insurance company's specific surcharge schedule.

Texas is an "at-fault" state, meaning the driver who caused the accident is responsible for damages. This determination directly impacts your insurance rates and will appear on your driving record for up to five years. If the accident also triggered a license suspension, you may also need SR-22 filing in Texas for 2 years under Texas Transportation Code §601.072 before you can drive again.

Texas is a proportionate (modified) comparative-negligence state under Civil Practice and Remedies Code Chapter 33. The rule matters for your insurance rate because the percentage of fault assigned at the scene — or later by adjusters — directly drives how your carrier codes the loss.

• 0% at fault: no surcharge, other carrier subrogates.
• 1–50% at fault: you can recover damages reduced by your share, but your rate will still surcharge 10–25% in most cases.
• 51%+ at fault: you recover nothing from the other driver under Texas's 51% bar, and your carrier absorbs the loss. Surcharge is full: 20–50%.

In our offices we see clients get assigned 100% fault on a police report when 60/40 would have been defensible. Whenever a client walks into our Dallas or Garland locations with an at-fault letter, we ask three questions: Was there a police crash report (CR-3)? Did you admit fault in writing or on the recorded line? Was there a witness statement? If any of those answers open a door to split-fault, we tell the client to contact their claims adjuster before the file closes.

Every carrier in our book has a different surcharge multiplier for at-fault claims. Some surcharge for 36 months; others go 60. Some drop 40% of the surcharge after year one; others keep it flat until month 37 and then drop it cliff-style. This is exactly why re-shopping the market works — the same claim that earns a 42% surcharge with one company earns an 18% surcharge with another.

Here is the typical pattern we see for our Dallas-Fort Worth customers after a single at-fault loss under $5,000:

• Months 0–12: full surcharge (usually 25–45% above pre-accident rate).
• Months 13–24: surcharge drops by ~30% (so a 40% surcharge becomes ~28%).
• Months 25–36: another 30–40% drop; surcharge around 10–18%.
• Month 37+: surcharge drops off fully with most carriers; the Texas CLUE report still shows it for seven years.

Our agents book a calendar reminder for every post-accident client at month 10 to re-shop the market before renewal. One of our Plano clients rewrote last spring and cut her monthly premium from $186 back down to $103 — she stayed on the same vehicle and the same 100/300/100 coverage, just moved to a carrier whose surcharge schedule ended at month 24 instead of month 36.

In our offices we see panic right after a crash, so we built a short checklist. Print this or save it to your phone.

1. File the CR-3. If damages exceed $1,000 or anyone is injured, Texas requires a crash report. Request a copy from the investigating agency within 10 days.
2. Report to your carrier within 48 hours. Delay beyond 30 days can give the carrier grounds to deny the claim entirely.
3. Pull your CLUE report. LexisNexis Claims Loss Underwriting Exchange is what every future carrier will see. Confirm the claim coded correctly (collision vs. liability vs. split-fault).
4. Ask for accident forgiveness. Some carriers will honor it if this is your first loss in five years, even retroactively. Worth a phone call.
5. Take a defensive driving course. Texas DPS-approved courses can earn 5–10% off at renewal on top of any forgiveness. Court-ordered courses for a ticket do not count — it has to be voluntary.
6. Re-shop at month 10. Call us at (866) 252-6116 or stop into any of our Arlington, Fort Worth, Grand Prairie, Irving, or Mesquite offices. We run your profile across 35+ carriers in one sitting.

For clients whose at-fault accident also triggered a license suspension, we layer in SR-22 filing services — our agents handle the electronic filing the same day.