I was charged with fail to surrender insurance card, but did not have insurance at the time. If I plead guilty to the fail to surrender charge, will they somehow find out I was driving with no insurance and give me a bigger fine?

Pay the ticket and count your lucky stars that you weren't stopped by a more diligent officer. There is always a chance you could get charged later because the officer has 3 years to lay the charge but unless you gave the name of a company that you said you were insured with then they aren't likely to follow up. And for goodness sake go get insurance or don't drive! It doesn't matter how good a driver you are, it matters how bad a driver everyone else is and if you are involved in a collision without insurance and god forbid someone is seriously hurt..... well hopefully the close call will make you think twice.

It`s very unlikely, but not impossible...

..when I worked in the traffic enforcement unit, I would take note of everybody`s expired insurance, and note what insurance company people verbally advised me they were using. On slow days, I would go ahead and contact the different insurance companies to see if an active policy was in effect. In the meantime, I would`ve charged with them not having an insurance card.

I`d say 2 times out of 5, there was no active insurance policy when I double checked. At that time I would then charge them.

But most officers don`t go out of their way like that. 99% don`t.