ICBC to ask for 6.3% rate hike Friday

VANCOUVER (NEWS 1130) – Insurance rates could go up more than six per cent by next April as the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia (ICBC) prepares to ask the BC Utilities Commission for a rate hike.

ICBC will be asking for a 6.3 per cent increase to basic insurance rates Friday afternoon.

WATCH: New ICBC Fees Or Hidden Rate Hike?

This comes just less than a month after the insurer posted a net loss of more than half a billion dollars last month, projecting that number to hit more than $890 million by year’s end.

RELATED: ICBC woes could unravel B.C.’s financial security: finance minister

This year’s loss is on top of more than a billion dollars lost last year and ICBC staff say rate hikes could have been 40 per cent if efforts hadn’t been made over the past year to curb costs.

If this latest rate hike is approved, it will take effect April 1st and will mean the average driver can expect to pay at least 60 dollars more for insurance.

It also comes close to a year after B.C. Attorney General David Eby described ICBC’s financial woes as a “flaming dumpster fire.”

ICBC’s President and CEO Nicolas Jimenez says no increase is ever welcome, but it could have been much worse.

“It could’ve been over 40 per cent,” he adds. “I’m not at all suggesting that you know we’re happy that there’s a rate increase, we know that this is hard for customers, but at the same time, you know, we work really hard to try to make the system more sustainable.”

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