What Impact Does a Parking Ticket Have? Does It Affect Your Car Insurance?
Do parking tickets go on your record or affect insurance? Speeding tickets and other moving violations will typically impact car insurance prices. Parking tickets, however, are non-moving violations.
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Insurance Feature Writer
Rachel Bodine graduated from college with a BA in English. She has since worked as a Feature Writer in the insurance industry and gained a deep knowledge of state and countrywide insurance laws and rates. Her research and writing focus on helping readers understand their insurance coverage and how to find savings. Her expert advice on insurance has been featured on sites like PhotoEnforced, All...
Rachel Bodine
Farmers CSR for 4 Years
Leslie Kasperowicz holds a BA in Social Sciences from the University of Winnipeg. She spent several years as a Farmers Insurance CSR, gaining a solid understanding of insurance products including home, life, auto, and commercial and working directly with insurance customers to understand their needs. She has since used that knowledge in her more than ten years as a writer, largely in the insurance...
Leslie Kasperowicz
Updated June 2022
Getting a parking ticket can be annoying. But do parking tickets go on your record or affect your auto insurance premiums? Will you pay more for car insurance because you have an unpaid parking ticket? Today, we’re answering all your questions about how parking tickets affect car insurance.
Do parking tickets go on your record?
A parking ticket does not affect car insurance premiums. In fact, parking tickets aren’t even added to your record as a traffic violation.
Your car insurance company cannot see your parking citation. Even if they wanted to increase your premiums because of parking tickets, the insurance company would not be able to see the charges or increase your insurance rate.
The DMV and other authorities also cannot see your parking citation. Parking tickets aren’t published on your driving record background. Learn how to remove points off your license in each state.
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Do parking violations affect insurance premiums?
First, let’s make one thing clear. Parking tickets do not have any impact on your car insurance premiums.
Speeding tickets and other driving violations will typically impact car insurance prices. A parking violation, however, does not increase your auto insurance rates. You were not operating your motor vehicle when you received the infraction: it’s a non-moving violation, and it won’t impact your car insurance prices.
In the eyes of the insurance company, your history of getting parking tickets has no connection to your likelihood of making a claim. Frequently getting into accidents typically means you’re a bad driver, which means you’ll pay more for car insurance. Frequently receiving parking tickets does not mean you’re a bad driver.
Whether you have zero parking tickets, two parking tickets, or 200 parking tickets, you’ll pay the same car insurance prices as any other driver, all other things being equal. However, keep in mind that this is only for those that have a clean driving record. If you have been pulled over by a police officer for reckless driving, your rates may go up.
Which traffic tickets affect car insurance prices?
Many tickets can have a significant impact on car insurance prices. Generally, tickets given by police officers are more likely to affect car insurance prices than tickets given by municipal authorities like parking officers.
The types of tickets that are more likely to affect car insurance prices include:
- Speeding tickets
- Distracted driving tickets
- Careless or reckless driving
- Driving under the influence
- Other moving violations
These types of tickets will remain on your record for 3 to 5 years. They may raise your car insurance premiums significantly – especially if you have two or more of the above violations within a multi-year period. A single speeding ticket might not substantially affect car insurance prices, but two or more speeding tickets can cause rates to rise.
Can not paying a parking ticket cause insurance rates to rise?
Getting a parking ticket will not affect car insurance premiums. Ignoring a parking ticket, however, and refusing to pay that ticket, may affect car insurance premiums in the long run.
If you’re the registered owner of the vehicle that received the parking ticket, then you’re legally obligated to pay the fine attached to the parking ticket.
If you decide to not pay the parking ticket, then it may cause problems when you renew your vehicle registration.
Every state in America has passed laws requiring vehicle owners to pay parking tickets before registering a vehicle. You may not be able to renew or register a vehicle until you pay your past-due parking tickets.
If you choose to drive without registration and get caught, then you could face substantial penalties. This could lead to higher insurance prices in the long run.
In other words, your parking ticket could indirectly cause insurance prices to rise if you fail to pay them and fail to register your vehicle. In most cases, however, parking tickets have no impact on car insurance.
Conclusion: Do parking tickets go on your record?
Parking tickets never impact car insurance prices – as long as you pay the parking ticket. If you refuse to pay your parking ticket, then you could have trouble renewing your vehicle registration, which could lead to future insurance problems.
In the vast majority of cases, however, simply receiving a parking ticket and paying for that ticket will have no impact on car insurance premiums. Whether you have one parking ticket or 100 parking tickets, your parking tickets will not show up on your driver’s abstract, and your car insurance company has no way of tracking your parking violations.
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