Preferred roadside assistance vendor?

[ranger]

I just had an issue and required roadside assistance through my current policy with my insurer USAA. My experience was merely ok. I plan on traveling around the country in retirement sign so I may need more roadside assistance. Who has a favorite and why?

[TGS]

@RJ must be the go-to guy on this, I'm guessing.

[DamonL]

I use to use the American Automobile Association (AAA) before my insurance company offered the service.

[DamonL]

I use to use the American Automobile Association (AAA) before my insurance company offered the service. Now I just use my insurance company.

[BehindBlueI's]

From what I can tell they are all just a pre-paid contracting service and you are at the mercy of whatever local company they contact with. You're also a low priority. Here a police contact tow is required to be at the scene in 15 minutes or they lose the hook and another service can be started. Private tows are up to an hour through the exact same companies (we have to designate police/private when requesting a hook for someone).

[whomever]

"My experience was merely ok"

I guess one question is: would anyone else be better?

We've called the USAA 1-800 number maybe 3 times over the years, and have been happy with the results, i.e. a truck showed up within what we considered a reasonable time given the locations. My assumption (and I freely admit I'm just guessing) is that if Joe's Towing needs more business he (and his competitors) are likely to sign up for AAA, USAA, and everywhere else they can, and whoever you call is going to go down their list and contact the first tow service that is available. I'm sure willing to be connected.

It's convenient because it is just a rider on the policy, so there isn't a separate membership to keep track of.

[rob_s]

I stopped calling USAA and canceled roadside with them after I found out it counted as a “claim”. Didn’t raise my rate with them, JT showed up as having had a claim when I shopped quotes. As I understand it this isn’t unique to them.

I now use AAA. As mentioned, they all contract out and you’re at the mercy of the local guy, but for me it gives me (and more importantly, my wife) one simple number to call no matter where we are. I often have cell service but can’t get data to look up a local vendor on my own. Call aaa and I’m done with one call.

They also give various discounts which I’ve used successfully for rental cars and hotels. Even got a discount on a rental car in Norway!

[Malamute]

I have no experience with AAA, but allowed myself to fall for the State Farm sales line for towing insurance for $12/yr or whatever it was. I still tried fixing the truck on the side of the road out of town once, but when I actually needed a tow, I paid it, took the receipt to my agent with low expectations. They asked if I had it towed to the closest place it could be repaired, I relied in the affirmative, they handed me a check to reimburse me for the tow, no further drama. At that moment my days of trying to fix a vehicle on the side of the road ended.

[Balisong]

The gf and I have had AAA for a handful of years and used it 4 times in that span of time. Very happy with each one of those experiences. All of them were around town though, so I can't speak to their over-the-road service. For each of our cars, we had a dead battery and a tire flatten while driving (the tires were within a couple weeks of each other!) Each time they were there in a very reasonable amount of time. They even have a tracker you can watch and see where the driver was real time. In the case of my battery, it was actually dead in my garage and they still came and jumped it. That one was one of their actual vans and I had the option of buying a battery from them right there on the spot for a bit of a premium over going to AutoZone. That time I just had them jump it, but next time I may just buy from them to save some hassle/time out of my day. As some have mentioned there are also discounts on all sorts of stuff. For trips we usually plan enough ahead that we manage better deals than AAA discounts, but in a pinch they'll probably save you at least some money. We have ZERO intention on getting rid of AAA based on our experiences thus far.

[Totem Polar]

I have nothing but praise for AAA. I’ve been a member since high school. In our younger days, my wife and I were on the road between 150-200 dates a year, in shit-beater starving artist cars; to say we got our money’s worth out of AAA would be an understatement.

Most recently was a couple of years ago when the ignition switch went out in our jeep. It was late on a Saturday night after a solo gig, so I called AAA, and ran into the hook up delay BBI mentioned. I was told that it would be an hour, so I grabbed my stuff, and went down the block and had a nice plate of organic pasta and a couple of glasses of cab sauv. AAA texted me with updates, and when the tow driver got close, they called; I payed my tab, and went back down the block to meet him. Being after 11pm at this point, he towed the car to my driveway. On Monday morn, I made an appointment with our mechanic place, and that Friday AAA came and towed the rig from our house to the shop. So, yeah. All covered, btw.

As an aside, we always toured with a split of good GH Mumm Champagne that we picked up somewhere. That bottle rode around in our kit for almost 2 years, until one night the transmission in our Toyota van shit the bed going up snoqualmie pass around 23:45. We coasted over to the side of I-90, called AAA, and were informed that the closest guy was cle elum, and it would be about an hour. So we sat under the stars and drank the Mumms out of plastic solo cups. When the guy arrived, he loaded the van up, and we piled into the cab of his tow. He drove us all the way back across the state, telling us some awesome sasquatch stories the whole way. We exceeded our mileage by a whopping 28 bucks. Good times.

AAA FTMFW.