SAN DIEGO – Mexican law requires those driving into the country from the United States to have insurance or proof of financial responsibility in the event of an accident.
As a foreigner traveling in Mexico, the only way to demonstrate financial responsibility is to either have enough real-world currency to cover damages or an insurance policy from a company based in Mexico, as US-based and other non-Mexico-based insurance plans do not cover liability for potential accidents or fulfill the basic insurance requirement in Mexico.
For three decades, San Diego-based Baja Bound Insurance has served the important role of insurance for drivers traveling to Mexico.
Founder and CEO
Baja Bonded Insurance
Hank Morton, founder and CEO of Baja Bound, said the number of travelers south of the border continues to grow. The company hit a milestone of 250,000 customers last year with $10 million in gross annual premium revenue.
Without investors or taking on any debt, Morton’s Baja Bound Insurance has been connecting travelers with Mexican insurance companies since 1994.
Behind insurers HDI Seguros and Chubb Seguros, Baja Bound works with them to insure around 40,000 people each year.
“We are experts who specialize exclusively in Mexican insurance and have direct relationships with our insurance companies in Mexico,” said Morton, who grew up in Coronado. “Although we do not directly process or pay insurance claims, we are the largest producer for both of the companies we represent and have very close relationships with our companies’ management and claims departments. We go above and beyond to help and advocate for our customers through the claims process.”
Morton said the company’s mission from the beginning has been “to create the easiest, most understandable and most reliable way to get Mexican insurance online and to back it up with phenomenal customer service for the people who come to us.”
What was once an industry dominated by kiosks and driving at the border has now gone largely online because of Baja Bound and other similar pioneers in cross-border auto insurance, he said.
Morton said the company introduced the first mobile-ready site more than 10 years ago and continues to innovate by working to develop new insurance products with its Mexico-based insurance company partners. In 2022, Baja Bound launched a Mexican homeowners policy aimed at US citizens living in Mexico.
From the foundation to the first website to sell Mexican car insurance
Morton’s father, Dr. John “Doc” Morton, was a family physician who had a medical clinic in south San Diego, just four exits north of the Mexican border off Interstate 5. He regularly traveled to Baja Sur, Mexico with his family and friends for camping and surfing trips.
Seeing the need for insurance and having a clinic in such close proximity to the highway, Doc Morton built a small Mexican insurance car on one side of his business and named it Baja Bound Insurance. He operated on it for several years until he retired from practicing medicine in the mid-1990s and closed his clinic.
Hank Morton said that after graduating from college in the late 1990s, he worked for a biotech startup that was going through some transition in San Diego. Seeing no more opportunities there, he quit and decided to “learn everything I could about the emerging field of web development with the intention of becoming a freelancer.”
Morton said he thought his father’s Mexican insurance idea could fit very well on the Internet. As one of his first projects, he created what he says is “the first fully online Mexican car insurance website that allows you to get a quote, buy and print your policy from the comfort of your home.”
Morton said he has “revived my father’s (business) name,” but his Baja Bound Insurance is actually a completely new venture, with a focus on creating the easiest way to buy coverage online and save people the hassle of getting it on the border.
Baja Bound sold its first policy online in November 1999, and that’s when Morton said he realized it could be more than a web project and turned it into a legitimate business.
During the first two years of running the company, Morton handled everything from programming to marketing and customer service. In 2003, he hired Jeff Hill as his first employee, followed soon after by Hill’s sister, Jennifer Hill, who helps Baja Bound manage operations and handle customer service.
Now Baja Bound’s vice president of business development, Jeff Hill, who also grew up in Coronado and has been friends with Morton since high school and has gone on countless surf trips to Baja with Morton’s family, said the company’s biggest assets include “ having a great website and helping customers with claims.”
Vice President of Business Development
Baja Bonded Insurance
“Doing everything as well as possible has helped our business grow,” Hill said. “We’re also out there in the community showing people, ‘Hey, we don’t just sell insurance, we use it ourselves in Baja all the time.'”
COVID-19 recovery from travelers traveling to Baja
Morton said the company’s customers are mostly Southern California residents, although it attracts travelers from the U.S. and Canada, as well as a small number of customers from Europe.
Although the online-only company has had several different offices, all in downtown San Diego’s East Village, Baja Bound closed its last site during the COVID-19 pandemic and now operates remotely, but retains a shared office space in Liberty Station for personal meetings.
The company had a big challenge during the start of the pandemic, when people almost completely stopped traveling in 2020. Morton said that by 2021, Baja Bound has recovered and is actually up more than 20% from where it left off. in 2019
Business also slowed during the Great Recession of 2008-09 and with it increased fear about security in Mexico. By 2010, the Baja Bound began to recover as the economy improved, “people realized they were traveling safely in Mexico despite what they read in the media about cartel violence,” Morton said.
Morton said that among the company’s other challenges is one that faces it and Baja tourism as a whole: the continued misconception regarding the safety of tourists in Mexico.
“In terms of the perception of security, we let the facts speak for themselves,” he said. “While cartel violence may ebb and flow in different regions of Mexico, American tourists are not the target, nor is it happening in the areas they go to.”
Morton said the wait time for people at the border is something that comes up often among travelers. He said improving the wait at the border and making it easier to drive through Tijuana is a challenge that requires advocacy at the local, state and federal levels of the U.S. and Mexican governments.
Morton remains committed to the issue as a board member of the Smart Border Coalition, and notes that the Baja Bound website offers information on how to cross the border and provides updates with directions to the border and the latest developments.
Baja Bonded Insurance
ESTABLISHED: 1994
FOUNDER/CEO: Hank Morton
SEAT: San Diego
BUSINESS: Insurance
INCOME: $10 million gross annual premium
EMPLOYEES: 9
WEBSITE: bajabound.com
CONTACT: 888-552-BAJA (2252)
SOCIAL IMPACT: Baja Bound supports non-profit organizations on both sides of the border that focus on helping the environment, youth and mobility in Baja and Mexico
NOTABLE: Baja Bound Insurance founder Hank Morton’s father, Dr. John “Doc” Morton, went on family camping trips to Mexico where Hank Morton surfed and connected with many communities south of the border.
