Patent Issued for Adjusting insurance policies based on common driving routes and other risk factors (USPTO 11610270): State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company

2023 APR 06 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company (Bloomington, Illinois, United States) has been issued patent number 11610270, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx editors.

The patent’s inventors are Binion, Todd (Bloomington, IL, US), Christensen, Scott Thomas (Salem, OR, US), Cielocha, Steven (Bloomington, IL, US), Gay, Christopher E. (Dallas, TX, US), Hayward, Gregory (Bloomington, IL, US).

This patent was filed on June 18, 2021 and was published online on March 21, 2023.

From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: “The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.

“Insurance companies desire to collect vehicle and driver behavior data for use in enhancing policy holder risk assessment. Many companies employ vehicle monitoring system for a variety of purposes, including determining of insurance risk and/or premiums. These systems may monitor many vehicle attributes, such as location, speed, acceleration/deceleration, etc. The monitoring devices are integrated with the vehicle or plugged into the vehicle systems. Many of these monitoring systems require expert installation into the vehicle and further require the user to periodically withdraw the monitoring device to download the trip data.”

Supplementing the background information on this patent, NewsRx reporters also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “This Summary is provided to introduce a selection of concepts in a simplified form that are further described below in the Detailed Description. This Summary is not intended to identify key features or essential features of the claimed subject matter, nor is it intended to be used to limit the scope of the claimed subject matter.

“In an embodiment, a computer implemented method for providing insurance comprises receiving, via a computer network, a plurality of vehicle data, wherein the plurality of vehicle data includes, for a trip of the vehicle, at least a start point, an end point and a frequency value and analyzing, at one or more processors, the plurality of vehicle data to determine a driving route associated with the vehicle including the start point and the end point. The method also includes determining, at the one or more processors, based on the frequency value, that the driving route is a common driving route and determining, at the one or more processors, a risk level of the common driving route. The method further includes processing, at the one or more processors, one or more insurance options, including pricing and underwriting, based at least in part on the risk level of the common driving route.

“The figures depict a preferred embodiment of the present invention for purposes of illustration only. One skilled in the art will readily recognize from the following discussion that alternative embodiments of the structures and methods illustrated herein may be employed without departing from the principles of the invention described herein.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system for generating multi-point, user-specific risk-based vehicular routes based on vehicular sensor data received during vehicular operation, the vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system comprising: a server including one or more processors communicatively and remotely coupled, via a communications network, to one or more vehicle sensors onboard a vehicle, the one or more vehicle sensors configured to generate vehicle sensor data during operation of the vehicle as the vehicle navigates a plurality of driving routes; a computer memory communicatively coupled to the server, the computer memory configured to receive the vehicle sensor data during the operation of the vehicle, the vehicle sensor data comprising: (1) a set of points for each of the plurality of driving routes, wherein each point in the set of points defines a geographic location of the vehicle, as driven by a user; and (2) a set of risk factors defining one or more vehicle risks determined, via one or more processors, from the vehicle sensor data; and a vehicle account of the user, the vehicle account implemented on the computer memory, wherein the server is configured to: (a) determine, via the one or more processors and based on the vehicle sensor data, a common driving route of the user having a more frequent set of points from the set of points as compared with each of the plurality of driving routes, (b) associate, within the computer memory, one or more points of a common set of points with a set of risk factors, wherein at least one factor of the set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point of the more frequent set of points, © determine, via the one or more processors, a common driving route risk score based on the set of risk factors of the common driving route, wherein the common driving route risk score comprises a risk level specific to the common driving route, (d) associate, via the one or more processors, the vehicle account of the user with the common driving route, (e) generate, via the one or more processors, a plurality of insurance options specific to the risk level of the common driving route and a driving experience of the user, (f) transmit the plurality of insurance options for display and selection on a viewport of a client device of the user, and (g) receive from the client device viewport-based contrast adjustments for adjusting one or more of the plurality of insurance options based on the common driving route and the driving experience of the user and the set of risk factors of the common driving route of the user.

“2. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein the one or more vehicle risks includes an activated vehicle indicator onboard the vehicle.

“3. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 2, wherein the activated vehicle indicator is a check engine light.

“4. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein the common route risk score comprises scores for a length of the common driving route and frequency of use of the length of the common driving route.

“5. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein the server is further configured to determine a price quote based on the common route risk score.

“6. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein the server is further configured to: access a risk database to retrieve a second set of risk factors that correspond to the common set of points of the common driving route, wherein at least one risk factor of the second set of risk factors defines a parking risk factor of a parking location, and associate, within the computer memory, one or more points of the common set of points with the second set of risk factors, wherein at least the parking risk factor of the second set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point in the common set of points.

“7. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein an additional risk factor of the set of risk factors is selected from the group consisting of: a traversed intersection; a road type; a road hilliness; a road curviness; a road shoulder access; a number of stoplights; a number of stop signs; and a roadside hazard.

“8. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing system of claim 1, wherein the server is further configured to: access a risk database to retrieve a third set of risk factors that correspond to the common set of points of the common driving route, wherein at least one risk factor of the third set of risk factors defines a dangerous factor for the driving experience of the user driving in an urban environment, and associate, within the computer memory, one or more points of the common set of points with the third set of risk factors, wherein at least the dangerous factor of the third set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point in the common set of points.

“9. A vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method for generating multi-point, user-specific risk-based vehicular routes based on vehicular sensor data received during vehicular operation, the vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method comprising: (a) determining, by one or more processors and based on vehicle sensor data of a vehicle, a common driving route of a user having a more frequent set of points selected from a plurality of driving routes, wherein the one or more processors are communicatively and remotely coupled, via a communications network, to one or more vehicle sensors onboard the vehicle, the one or more vehicle sensors configured to generate the vehicle sensor data during operation of the vehicle as the vehicle navigates the plurality of driving routes, and wherein the vehicle sensor data comprises: (1) a set of points for each of the plurality of driving routes, wherein each point in the set of points defines a geographic location of the vehicle, as driven by a user; and (2) a set of risk factors defining one or more vehicle risks determined, via one or more processors, from the vehicle sensor data, (b) associating, within a computer memory, one or more points of the common set of points with a set of risk factors, wherein at least one factor of the set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point of the more frequent set of points, wherein the computer memory is communicatively coupled to the one or more processors and is configured to receive the vehicle sensor data during the operation of the vehicle; © determining, via the one or more processors, a common driving route risk score based on the set of risk factors of the common driving route, wherein the common driving route risk score comprises a risk level specific to the common driving route; (d) associating, via the one or more processors and within the computer memory, a vehicle account of the user with the common driving route; (e) generating, via the one or more processors, a plurality of insurance options specific to the risk level of the common driving route and a driving experience of the user; (f) transmitting the plurality of insurance options for display and selection on a viewport of a client device of the user; and (g) receiving viewport-based contrast adjustments from the client device for adjusting one or more of the plurality of insurance options based on the common driving route and the driving experience of the user and the set of risk factors of the common driving route of the user.

“10. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9, wherein the one or more vehicle risks includes an activated vehicle indicator onboard the vehicle.

“11. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 10, wherein the activated vehicle indicator is a check engine light.

“12. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9, wherein the common route risk score comprises scores for a length of the common driving route and frequency of use of the length of the common driving route.

“13. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9 further comprising determining a price quote based on the common route risk score.

“14. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9 further comprising: accessing a risk database to retrieve a second set of risk factors that correspond to the common set of points of the common driving route, wherein at least one risk factor of the second set of risk factors defines a parking risk factor of a parking location; and associating, within the computer memory, one or more points of the common set of points with the second set of risk factors, wherein at least the parking risk factor of the second set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point in the common set of points.

“15. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9, wherein an additional risk factor of the set of risk factors is selected from the group consisting of: a traversed intersection; a road type; a road hilliness; a road curviness; a road shoulder access; a number of stoplights; a number of stop signs; and a roadside hazard.

“16. The vehicle sensor based vehicular routing method of claim 9 further comprising: accessing a risk database to retrieve a third set of risk factors that correspond to the common set of points of the common driving route, wherein at least one risk factor of the third set of risk factors defines a dangerous factor for the driving experience of the user driving in an urban environment; and associating, within the computer memory, one or more points of the common set of points with the third set of risk factors, wherein at least the dangerous factor of the third set of risk factors corresponds to at least one point in the common set of points.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Binion, Todd. Adjusting insurance policies based on common driving routes and other risk factors. U.S. Patent Number 11610270, filed June 18, 2021, and published online on March 21, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11610270)&db=USPAT&type=ids

(Our reports deliver fact-based news of research and discoveries from around the world.)