S.C. drivers face higher limits in new year

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The new year will force about a third of South Carolina’s drivers to dig deeper into their wallets to pay for auto insurance.

A little-debated change in state law requires drivers to buy minimum liability coverage of $25,000 for a single injury in a wreck, $50,000 for multiple injuries and $25,000 for property damage. That’s a sharp increase from the current limits of $15,000, $30,000 and $10,000.

Those will be among the nation’s highest minimum amounts. Alaska, Maine, Minnesota and North Carolina all have higher bodily injury amounts.

The auto insurance law was attached to a bill by state Sen. Gerald Malloy, D-Hartsville, without public hearings. Gov. Mark Sanford vetoed the bill, but the Legislature overrode the veto.

“There was no credible evidence that it needed to be done,” Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer said. It “appears to be a case of the president of the Trial Lawyers Association sneaking in a provision that would benefit people he represents in a professional capacity rather than people he represents in the Senate.”

Allison Love, executive director of the South Carolina Insurance News Service, said drivers needing to increase limits could pay another $118 a year, which some worry will cause more drivers to go without coverage.