MetroMile: Cheap car insurance, but the OBDII dongle doesn’t actually report Check Engine codes.

I use MetroMile for my car insurance.

With what my ex did to ruin my credit, they’re the only car insurance company that isn’t taking it out on me with really sky high insurance premiums for minimum coverage.

But one feature they claim their OBDII dongle can do is detect engine trouble codes and report on them to you.

Earlier this month, my Check Engine Light came on and it turned out it had been storing a pending code for three cylinders misfiring and just not displaying the light yet, and what finally made it come on was the upstream O2 sensor totally failing, which caused the engine to run so poorly that the computer went ahead and turned on the light.

For two days until I could get the car towed down to the shop, I kept waiting on MetroMile’s insurance dashboard to give me the engine codes, but it kept saying nothing to report, and then I noticed in tiny letters that it may not detect everything.

If it can’t detect three cylinders misfiring and a dead oxygen sensor, what will it detect?

And it’s not even the first time this has happened. It also didn’t detect any problems any of the times my ABS warning light was on or when my EGR valve failed.

These are fairly easy and standard codes, and I don’t drive an exotic or rare car. It’s just a 2003 Chevy Impala. I’m wondering what data this thing actually is capable of collecting. It does show my trips and what speed I was traveling on them, which I’m sure that MetroMile was careful to get right because they would be useful in assigning fault in an accident claim. But for Check Engine codes, it seems it doesn’t actually do anything.

I keep MetroMile’s app off my phone because it says it wants precise location access even in the background and the ability to monitor whether you’re using the phone while driving. (Almost certainly so they can increase your premiums later.)

If it’s not even telling you what’s wrong with the car, and you can file claims by calling a toll-free number or on their website with pictures you took on your phone, why use it?

Maybe for roadside claims, but insurers put these in CLUE and use them to raise your rates, so I use AAA instead.