Cell phones means we can usually depend on calling for help if our car breaks down. But, without a phone book who do we call? I don’t have any of the local towing services or Taxis numbers memorized. I have a basic cell phone. Nothing fancy and it’s not a smart phone.
If I’m on a trip then I certainly don’t know any of the local repair shops or towing places. Full service stations with mechanics on duty are a thing of the past.
If you’re broke down on a city street, highway, or Interstate can you call 911? What services are they willing to offer? Will they dispatch a tow truck? Send a taxi? Laugh their asses off and hang up? Do you have to be injured to get 911 services on the highway?
What do you do when a car breaks down in the 21st century? Is AAA still the best resource for getting any real help?
In some cases doesn’t AAA try to fix the problem instead of towing? Change a tire, add a gallon of gas or try to restart the car ?
It would be nice if 911 had mechanics on speed dial.
I’ve always thought 911 would at least call a tow truck or send a police cruiser. But didn’t know for sure. I worry more as I get older about car trips. It’s kind of scary being on an Interstate and trusting that car motor keeps running. I always get the oil changed, new air filter, add air to tires before a trip. But, there’s still a lot that can go wrong.
Getting stranded in August is an emergency. You can get heat stroke pretty quick. Or hypothermia in the winter.
I’ve started keeping a phone book in the car, since I never really need it at home and I often need it in the car. It comes in handy and the small version fits neatly in the back pocket of the passenger seat. Just saying.
There is no reason whatsoever not to have towing/labor coverage through your automobile insurer. It’s a separate coverage from collision/comp, so even if you just have liability, you can have T/L. It’s usually very cheap, just a couple dollars a month at the most.
You can still get AAA if you want extra towing insurance. But get the primary coverage through the auto carrier you already have. It’s going to be cheaper than AAA any day (although of course AAA comes with other discounts too).
Actually, there is a very good reason. Auto insurers will report your towing/labor claims to the national CLUE data base. CLUE is sort of like the credit reporting bureau for insurance companies. Insurance companies share your claims history through CLUE and use it to make underwriting decisions when you apply for or renew insurance. Some states regulate insurance rates (New Jersey for example) and others don’t (Illinois for example). Where it is allowed, some insurance companies may take your towing claims into consideration when they decide whether to issue a policy and what price to charge you. You may find your liability rates increase because you made too many towing claims. They may even take your automobile claims history account when issuing homeowners and other insurance coverages.
It may be in your best interest to get your towing coverage from some other source.
Can’t speak for every state, but in Missouri dialing *55 gets you to the highway patrol, who are more than happy to call you a tow or send a trooper out to check on you. The number’s on signs placed at frequent intervals along the interstates and major highways.
911 or, if posted, the number for the highway patrol. *55 in Missouri has already been mentioned. I’ve also seen *99 and *990. If you call 911 instead of the highway patrol they’ll transfer you.
Sure, why not?
Actually, if you have a problem on the freeway other people are very likely to call 911 on your behalf. I’ve done it when I’ve seen people have problems on the road, and about half the time the 911 operator tells me I’m not the first to call it in. Truckers also have a radio and may report motorists in distress on channel 9, the emergency and roadside assistance channel. The highway patrol typically monitors that channel.
The services offered are pretty basic - an ambulance/rescue service if there are medical issues, and if not an officer in a patrol car who can do whatever police can normally do including, yes, help you get a tow. Some places have highway helper patrols specifically to assist with the most common break-down reasons, so you might get one of those instead of an officer.
This is a good question. Last Saturday we were on the road covering about 600 miles both flyover country and urban multilane freeways. Not sure where would be the worst place to break down. The car never missed a beat. Monday on my wife’s 5 mile drive to work, the fuel pump quit. Nice of it to wait.
I love AAA. I will change my own tire nine out of ten times, but for the ten below zero day when you have a flat or the battery isn’t cranking it is nice to be able to call AAA.
Tennessee Department Of Transportation provides highway emergency trucks near large cities.
EMT trained drivers, big chemical fire extinguishers, radio/cellphones, limited ability to tow you off the interstate, & up to 1 pint of gas or all the radiator water you need, to get to the nearest filling station. They’ll help you get a tow truck, & stay with you until it arrives, too.
Anything to prevent traffic jams, & it’s a heck of a lot cheaper than building 4 more lanes of concrete, only to see them jam up anyway.
Another thought: your cell phone company may offer road service. I used to have it through T Mobile, and I think my parents still do. Also, Allstate insurance has been advertising their road service a lot recently, touting it as something anyone could use at any time. Might be worth investigating.
That said, 911 will usually help by sending an officer to your location, who will help you out. A lot of police duty hours are spent sitting with flashing lights to make sure that a roadside breakdown is visible to traffic, waiting for a tow truck. Some jurisdictions allow officers to drive you to the nearest gas station to fill up a gas can or something minor. When I worked at a hotel on the interstate, I got a lot of business from local police dropping someone off after their cars had been towed to a nearby mechanic.
I have this with AT&T and have used it twice for a tow. They pay for the first 15 miles or something like that. I can’t recall, but I think that we pay for that and it is an incredibly small amount compared to the two tows that I have gotten out of it.
Also, some insurance companies (looking at YOU, Geico!) will only have your car towed to the nearest certified dealer for your car, not your mechanic. I never use the dealer for service, and I love my mechanic, so their “roadside service” is completely useless to me.
Former 911 dispatcher. If you called 911 for a tow truck, I’d have told you that 911 is for life-and-death emergencies and 411 is for tows.
We also only called owner-request tows in certain circumstances, based on a tow rotation list, and never just because someone calls us and asks us to.
I work for a large law enforcement agency. Smaller agencies almost definitely do things differently. Our lines are almost always busy, and we are always understaffed, though. We are not going to waste time calling tows for people perfectly capable of doing it themselves when actual emergencies need our attention.
Visa and Mastercard both have roadside assistance programs for selected cards. Unlike AAA, these services are not prepaid, you will have to pay for the service every time you call.
Visa has Roadside Dispatch available for all Visa Signature cards and for some Gold and Platinum cards (it is up to your card issuer (Chase, Citibank, BofA, etc) to determine whether to include this service with your card, so call them to ask). You simply call 1-800-VISA-TOW and they will arrange for towing.
Mastercard has a similar program called Roadside Assistance. Call 1-800-MC-ASSIST to find out if it is included with your Mastercard and to request Roadside Assistance. Or call your card issuer to find it if it is included.
Again, let me emphasize that all these services do is arrange for road service. You will have to pay the service provider. Both claim that you can charge the fees to their respective credit cards. I don’t know how well their services work or if they have networks of service providers as extensive as AAA does.
