Road Service Is Still Top Draw for Auto Clubs
Some years ago, a Californian had an accident after midnight on the Sunrise Highway in Nassau County, N.Y. With help, he pushed his disabled car to the roadside and went to a nearby pay phone to call a 24-hour tow service. “But I couldn’t get anyone: Either there was nobody there or they’d ask, ‘Are you a AAA member?’ and when I said no, they wouldn’t come out. I hitched a ride and came out with a truck the next day, and then I joined the club so that wouldn’t happen to me again.”
Emergency road service is the prime reason a quarter of the nation’s licensed drivers join auto clubs. They want “hassle-free driving,” says Bob Austin, spokesman for Volvo Cars of North America, which is giving buyers of new Volvos three years of membership in the Amoco Motor Club. “We couldn’t assure the car would never have a problem, given bad weather and road hazards,” Austin says, “but we could provide a way to solve the problem, if they could get to a phone.”
Sometimes a phone isn’t enough, even with fabled AAA, or “Triple A”--the 85-year-old American Automobile Assn. whose 161 affiliated clubs blanket the nation. No auto club provides emergency service everywhere, and some don’t provide it at all, although it’s not always clear from the sales pitches.
Competition for Drivers
And pitches they are: These clubs are not fraternal but commercial. Two decades ago, the AAA had 90% of the business. Its 27.7 million members now constitute 60% of auto club customers, the rest going to more recent entrants in the field, often companies in auto-associated businesses.
Allstate Insurance, for example, started its Allstate Motor Club (current membership: 2.5 million) in 1961, because “we needed another product for Allstate agents to sell,” says Doug Closs, the club’s product development manager. Amoco Motor Club was started in 1964 by the oil company, in part, says an Amoco spokesman, “to support our service station dealers” with work for their service bays. It now has 4.1 million members, 40% signed up through other organizations--the American Assn. of Retired Persons, Diners Club and now Volvo.
The AAA provided the model for both service and price--under $50 for membership in most clubs, most places. Needing help, the motorist calls a local number or a national “supernumber” (800-336-HELP), and a dispatcher takes his location and sends out one of a network of 16,000 contracted tow truck owners--usually service stations. If the tow truck driver can’t get the car going, he tows it to his own garage for repair or to any other requested garage within five miles.
In certain rural and remote areas, there is no contract service, and the motorist must make his own arrangement, finding his own tow or getting a “supernumber counselor” to help him find one. He also pays for it, and his AAA club will reimburse him--a situation that came up in only 2% of last year’s road service calls.
Requests for Help
Not all of last year’s 18.8 million calls involved emergencies, and most were near home. Of the 3 million calls taken by the Automobile Club of Southern California, the nation’s largest affiliate, 47.6% involved “can’t start” problems caused by battery, electrical or mechanical troubles, 28% were breakdowns requiring towing, 11.3% flat tires, 1.9% no gas and 11.2% lockouts.
Several other clubs offer dispatch service. Amoco (800-START UP) has 6,240 contracted providers for on-the-spot repairs or a tow to the contractor’s home garage or any other garage within five miles. Allstate (which has dispatch service in 27 states) has no mileage limit, covering instead the first $50 of tow charged by one of its 2,000 contract services. National Auto Club, a statewide club open only to California residents, is “full-service” (i.e., offers dispatch) only in its own region.
No club, of course, can be everywhere: “If they’re out in East Slobovia, Montana,” says Allstate’s Closs, “we can’t help them.” All, therefore, offer reimbursement programs for areas where they have no one to dispatch.
Some clubs offer nothing but reimbursement. They don’t actually provide “emergency towing and road service,” as the Chevron Travel Club implies. The motorist must find, call and contract for such services himself, then submit a claim for reimbursement--up to $40, for example, from Chevron (450,000 members), and up to $80 from Montgomery Ward’s Auto Club (2.4 million members).
All auto clubs, starting with the AAA, offer a variety of services more or less associated with driving, and more or less useful--trip-planning, maps and guidebooks, emergency cash, bail bonds and legal help and sometimes accidental death and dismemberment insurance. After all, says Richard White, AAA spokesman at national headquarters in Falls Church, Va., “the real benefit of a motor club is peace of mind.”
One gets even more dubious benefits from the reimbursement clubs. Chevron, for example, has a roster including lost credit card reporting, lost key return and three $1,000 “hit and run, car and home theft rewards” for anyone providing information that leads to the conviction of someone who hit or stole from the member.
Montgomery Ward offers ambulance service reimbursement and some coverage of attorney’s fees for members who sue uninsured motorists.
Some such needs may already be covered by the motorist’s credit card issuer, his auto or health insurance. Even reimbursement--if that’s all the motorist wants--may be offered by his auto insurer. State Farm, for example, the nation’s largest, offers optional coverage for $4 to $12 a year, depending on the area, with no set limit to the amount reimbursed.
But reimbursement doesn’t seem the pressing concern. Only 9% of Chevron’s members even made claims last year, while more than 50% of AAA members drew on its emergency road services. Indeed, one of the reimbursers, Montgomery Ward, has started offering dispatch service this year in several states, recognizing perhaps that many consumers want “not reimbursement but security,” says an Allstate club member, “some assurance we’ll have help if we break down on the highway.”
Others get too secure, and Southern California’s Auto Club is about to make its service a little less hassle-free. Starting in July, there will be a limit of four free calls a year, so it can stay an emergency, not a convenience, service.
