Peters Insurance : Easy As Can Be

The Peters Insurance Team of Mark Richardson, Beth Peters Hildebeidel and Jon Chandler are ready to answer your questions..

We were talking in the office recently about life’s milestones and how they can often trigger changes in life insurance needs. Weddings, births and funerals are, of course, the big ones. And when a teenager in your home starts to drive, the law requires an upgrade to your vehicle coverage.

But others often slip past unnoticed or unrecognized. For instance, your life insurance needs at 50 may be a lot different than your needs at 30. A new job, a new career or even the decision to start your own business can all affect your income, and therefore your life insurance needs. One milestone that many people are passing this month is taking children to college, where they will begin preparing for their own adult lives.

This is an excellent opportunity to talk to your child about the need for and benefit of life insurance. Scott and I have had life insurance for our children for years, but then, we are in the business. For many people the idea of life insurance for children doesn’t occur to them until something drastic happens, but there are many benefits to insuring your children early.

For starters, it locks in their insurability, so that if they did get sick or something else happened later in life, they can maintain their coverage. Second, insurance is very inexpensive for younger, healthier adults. And finally, if you have co-signed for student loans to help your child attend college and something awful happens, you could still be liable for repayment of those loans.

Our new colleague, Mark Richardson, is an expert in life insurance and he explains that there are many different types of policies to cover you at different times of your life.

Term Life is the simplest form. It is a policy with a pre-determined term – usually 10 to 20 years – and can be obtained fairly inexpensively if you are healthy. Term Life is ideal for young adults as they are leaving the nest, starting their own careers and families and have minimal coverage needs. A term policy can also be converted to Permanent Life, which offers additional investment benefits.

Universal Life is good for those with a growing family because it also provides an investment benefit. It can be used to save for college costs, retirement or those unexpected emergencies and the investment is tax-deferred so you get the best value for your dollar.

Annuities are also a great option for those with families or those looking ahead to the retirement years. As my colleague Jon Chandler likes to say, “Annuities are like the automatic creation of an estate.”

If you’re at a stage of life where your insurance needs are changing – or even if you want to prepare for those inevitable changes – I encourage you to contact Mark at our office – 610-262-5524 – and ask him for an analysis of your insurance needs. Learn more about life insurance.

Beth

Meet The Team

One of our goals with this blog is to give you a chance to get to know us a little better, so each post we will introduce another member of our team and talk about their job, their specialties and their lives. Of course, we have to start with Jon Chandler, who has been an integral part of Peters Insurance for 21 years.

Jon Chandler

Jon is a Lehigh Valley native who grew up in Macungie and graduated from West Virginia University with a degree in Marketing and Communications. Jon specializes in commercial insurance and works with concrete and excavating companies as well as auto mechanics and print shops. He is a Certified Insurance Counselor and is currently studying to become a Certified Risk Manager.

“Jon is really a well-rounded agent who also handles auto, life and personal insurance,” said Beth Peters Hildebeidel.

The father of two grown sons – one in grad school and the other at college, he lives in the Macungie area with his wife, Joann, a chemist at Merck. Jon is a motorcycle enthusiast who enjoys photography, music and travel – and he is planning to start playing golf.

“The most important thing to me,” Jon says, “is that my clients are doing okay. If they have a problem, I will respond immediately whether they spend $100 a year with us or $100,000.”

Lock Down Your Rates!

Now you can lock down your vehicle insurance policy rates for 10 YEARS thanks to the new Erie Rate Lock endorsement – even if you have a claim! That’s right, a 10-year lock-in opportunity, which means your annual rates would change only if you:

• Add or remove a vehicle from the policy;
• Add or remove a driver;
• Or change your garaging (home) address.

The endorsement can be added when one of the three changes occur or on the policy anniversary date. Get in touch via our website or call us at 610-262-5524 to learn more.

Scott and I recently took a short vacation to Mexico to celebrate our 25^th wedding anniversary. It was nice to get away for a few days and just spend some time together. We left the gloomy, chilly, rainy weather of early May behind and enjoyed some fun in the sun. When we returned, however, we found that our car had been broken into while it was parked at a hotel deck in Newark airport.

Several other vehicles had also been broken into and we thought we got off easy because the only things that were taken were the garage door opener and the vehicle registration and insurance information, which was left in the glove compartment.

We were concerned because our addresses and names are on the card, which automatically raises issues about identity theft. But we really didn’t think much of it until I did a little research and found out that the information on those cards could be used for “auto identity theft.”  The way this works, apparently, is that the thieves can use the information on the registration card to “legitimize” a stolen car by applying our vehicle registration and identification numbers, which are typically provided on the registration cards.

Some media outlets have reported that up to 50,000 cars are “cloned” through this method, making it hard for police and investigators to clearly prove a car is stolen. It can also cause trouble for the owner of the original cards if those vehicles are involved in an accident or crime.

In one scheme, thieves reportedly rent a car from an agency, use the stolen information to legitimize the vehicle and sell it to an unsuspecting buyer. A few days later, they steal the car back and return it to the rental agency as if nothing had happened. The agency is unaware of the fraud that was perpetrated because the vehicle was returned and the thieves pocket the money from the illegal sale.

If you are a victim of stolen or lost vehicle registration or insurance cards, please contact your agent and the state Department of Motor Vehicles as soon as possible. Ask the state to put a “Lost and/or stolen” warning on the title information so that it is flagged in case another vehicle is reported with that same identifying information.

The best way to avoid identity theft and auto identity theft, of course, is to keep all documentation with your name, address and other personal information safe and secure. Do not leave it in the vehicle when you are not driving it and report any thefts immediately.

So far we have not seen any problems resulting from this theft, but we will remain on alert for the foreseeable future.

I hope you have a happy and safe summer vacation season.

Beth

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Erie Identity Theft Coverage Can Protect Your Reputation and Property

Recovering from identity theft can be costly and time-consuming, often taking hours or days to wade through the red tape of various agencies, organizations and businesses to reclaim your name and reputation – especially if the thieves have used your identity to commit fraudulent purchases.

Erie can help. For a small annual fee, we offer identity theft coverage that can protect you from lost wages, certain legal fees – including the expenses for defending any civil suit brought against the insured by a creditor or collection agency and for removing any civil judgment wrongfully entered against the insured as a result of stolen identity.

It will also cover the costs of re-filing applications for loans, grants or other credit; notarizing affidavits or similar documents; miscellaneous expenses up to $1,000; ordering credit reports, postage, phone and shipping fees related to identity theft and fraud; and some personal expenses related to child- or senior-care needs, if needed.

Contact us today to learn more about what we can do to protect you from identity theft.

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Peters Insurance Welcomes New Team Member

We are happy to announce Mark Richardson of Bethlehem as our newest affiliate partner. Mark is an insurance industry veteran who will work with our clients to provide Life and Health Insurance, Group Life and Annuities. He is a graduate of Moravian College in Bethlehem and enjoys swimming, coaching and the Iron Pigs. Stop by and say hello!

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In Our Community

Peters Insurance supports a variety of activities and organizations that work throughout the Lehigh Valley to make our community a better place to live and work. One of our favorites is
Sportsfest, the three-day event held in Allentown every July. Sportsfest celebrates the amateur athletes who train and compete for the love of sport and it draws more than 10,000 athletes and more than 100,000 spectators every year.

Sportsfest needs volunteers to help the events run smoothly, assist the athletes and guide spectators. If you are interested in volunteering for this great event, which runs this year from July 14-17, please contact Beth at 610-262-5524 or go to http://www.sportsfest.org/about/volunteers.phtml for more information. Thanks. Hope to see you there!

Beth Peters Hildebeidel and Jon Chandler, CIC

Welcome to our blog. We will use this space to keep you updated on all the great new happenings here at Peters Insurance, tell you a little about ourselves, our people and our services, and keep you informed on the latest “buzz” in the insurance industry and how it affects you, your life, your property and your investments.

First of all, there have been a lot of wonderful things happening at Peters Insurance over the past few months and I wanted to take the opportunity in this initial post to tell you what we are doing and what it means for you, our customers and friends.

The first thing you will notice is our new “busy bee” logo on all of our new material. Our bee has been dubbed “David A.” as a tribute to my father, David A. Peters, who started this agency almost 35 years ago. He built this business through good, old-fashioned shoe leather, going door-to-door to meet new clients and build lasting friendships and relationships that we value today. But as we all know, the world has changed and we have to adapt.

That’s why Peters Insurance has undergone an image makeover. We worked with Sayre Design of Emmaus to create an image that evokes the friendly service you have come to expect while reaching out to new generations of friends and clients.

Sayre Design endeavored to embody qualities that everyone wants in their insurance agency—knowledgeable, confident, friendly, and fair. “We are particularly pleased that the new bee avatar, ‘David A.,’ connects the past and the present with a completely up-to-date marketing concept,” says designer Michael Sayre.  “This work correctly positions Peters Insurance now and for the future.”

Sincerely,

Beth Peters Hildebeidel