# Rental car insurance question: How do I get my partner covered?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rental-car-insurance-question-how-do-i-get-my-partner-covered/1028722>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 23, 2026, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rental-car-insurance-question-how-do-i-get-my-partner-covered/1028722 "2026-03-23T22:05:36Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 15

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\
**Post date:** [March 26, 2026, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rental-car-insurance-question-how-do-i-get-my-partner-covered/1028722/15 "2026-03-26T17:41:51Z")

</div>

> [@jnglmassiv](#):
>
> I would be interested to see the language in the email.

Sure. The final response from them was (verbatim except for changed names and clarifications I added in brackets):

> I am so sorry that this question has turned into a headache. We have gotten a few different answers from a few different underwriters, and the one from yesterday definitely gave us the wrong answer for Oregon. We do not require [your partner] to be registered for the coverage to extend seamlessly to a car you or her rent. She can be second or first named and it is the same. I don’t know how they gave so many different answers other than some states have different requirements, but Oregon policies are good to go without [her] being a registered owner [on the vehicle registration]. I called again today and spoke with an executive senior underwriter to let them know we have gotten several conflicting answers, and he confirmed we are correct that [she] and you are both covered under the extended coverage from the [car insured under your policy].
> 
> I even had him notate the account since it has been back and forth, again I am so sorry for the inconvenience of you having to keep checking. One thing to note, if you are going to rent a car for more than 30 days in a year then there is a small endorsement we want to add that acknowledges we are extending coverage to a non-owned car for more than a simple vacation for example.

> [@Jasmine](#):
>
> Then the answer should be “yes” because, by both of you being named on the policy as covered, you should both equally receive all the benefits enumerated on the policy

You’d think, right? But apparently half the company doesn’t know that either 😅 I didn’t think they were trying to give me the runaround on purpose. It was probably just run of the mill bureaucratic incompetence of the sort @ParallelLines was familiar with.

In fact State Farm has been very good to us, having reimbursed a bike theft, a rear-end crash that destroyed some expensive bikes, and [arson that destroyed our other car](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/so-someone-set-our-car-on-fire/1021118/). Despite all that, they haven’t raised our premiums or dropped us.

I wasn’t trying to set them up for failure, lol, I was just trying to get an answer to what I thought would be a straightforward question.

> [@TroutMan](#):
>
> Ah, new to insurance, are you? 😆

Apparently so! 😅 Every time I sign up for a policy, it feels a bit like gambling at the casino… except I don’t even know which game I’m playing or how much money I’m betting. The only thing more confusing to me is US healthcare policy. (Not going there in this thread!)

---

_[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rental-car-insurance-question-how-do-i-get-my-partner-covered/1028722)._