If you drive in California and your windshield cracks after New Yearâs, a glass shop that offers you a gift card to file the claim is breaking the law. So is an insurance adjuster who pressures you into using the companyâs shop.
Both changes come from SB 988, the California Motor Vehicle Glass Act. The governor signed it September 27. It takes effect January 1, 2027.
Hereâs the pitch it targets. A shop offers to handle everything: you sign one form and it bills your insurer directly. That form is an assignment of benefits, and it hands your claim rights to the shop. The billâs author says the result can be âinflated claims or overbilling,â skipped camera calibration, and claims that insurers deny or fight in court. Somebody pays for that litigation, and the Senate analysis is blunt about who: it âcan increase insurance premiums for all consumers.â
Starting January 1, an assignment of benefits on a glass claim is void. Shops canât offer you cash, gift cards, coupons or âany other thing of valueâ to file one. They canât tell you the job is free until your insurer has actually confirmed coverage. And they canât sign a contract with you until youâve opened the claim yourself and have a claim or referral number.
The insurance trade groups backed the bill, and so did Safelite. The opposition list was about 20 glass shops and two industry groups. That split tells you who expected to win, but the bill also has a clause the independents should like: your insurer can recommend a shop and run a network, but it canât âmislead, threaten, or coerceâ you into using one.
Why does this matter now? Glass isnât a $300 job anymore. The analysis, citing Kelley Blue Book, puts an older carâs windshield at roughly $300 to $600 and a newer car with driver-assist cameras at over $1,000, because the camera behind the glass has to be re-aimed. A botched calibration means lane keeping or automatic braking thatâs quietly off. The new law makes the shop tell you, before the job, whether your car needs that and whether itâll do it to the manufacturerâs spec. Afterward, you get a written result.
Translation: the gift card was never free. The calibration notice is.
Do this when the glass breaks. Call your insurer first and get the claim number. Ask your shop, in writing, three questions: does my car have driver assist, does it need recalibration, and will you do it to the manufacturerâs spec? Get the good-faith estimate before work starts and the itemized invoice after. Our windshield calibration guide covers what that line item should look like.
Pick your own shop. If the claims rep says you have to use theirs, say no. After January 1, the lawâs on your side.
Before January 1, none of this is required. Ask for all of it anyway, and donât sign anything that hands over your claim. Check that you even carry glass coverage with our coverage types guide.
One gap: you canât sue under the act. Penalties top out at $2,000 per repeat violation, and only a city attorney, county counsel or the attorney general can bring them. Report a shop that dangles a gift card. Then go somewhere else.
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