Driving Lessons – Insuring Your Car

As you progress with your driving lessons and begin to see a happy ending in sight, your attention will start to move towards the possibility of buying a car and insuring it for use on the road. If you didn’t already know, you’ll soon become aware of the minefield that awaits you.

Unfortunately insuring your car is an expensive business especially when you are a new driver and under the age of 25. You’ll almost certainly find yourself paying in excess of £2500 per year for the privilege, and this for owning a car far less expensive.

The first thing you must do is to compare the market. Find as many insurers as you possibly can and get a quote from all, even if you have never heard of them before. It’s quite possible the more well known the insurer the more expensive they will be as they have the ability to bring in new customers just through good advertising and clever marketing. Some much smaller companies will even be web-based only, with no offices, meaning lower costs for them so lower costs for you. As long as you check terms and conditions and your insurance contract to make sure it’s not missing something important or requiring you to pay a huge excess in the event of an accident, then it really doesn’t matter.

Once you have your quotes the next thing you need to do is haggle. Most people are scared to do this but it can save you tens if not hundreds of pounds. Every insurer will want, and potentially need, your business. You should take the cheapest 5 to 10 quotes and try to play them off each other. No-one will want to lose your business for the sake of a few pounds so begin by ringing around the 3rd, 4th, 5th or so cheapest companies and advise them of the cheapest quote you have received. They will almost certainly try to beat it. Once they have given you the new quote, if it is now the cheapest, you should ring the company which were originally the cheapest and then see what they can do for you.

Once you have done this you can feel satisfied you have the best possible price available. Years ago it used to be possible to insure your car under a parents name and put yourself down as a ‘named driver’. This would make your insurance a lot cheaper as it’s fooling the insurance companies into thinking your parent drives the car most of the time. Unfortunately the insurance industry and the law cottoned on to this and it is now forbidden. If you were to do this now and had an accident, it is probable the insurance company would not pay as your insurance would be deemed to be void. And you could face possible charges of driving without insurance as it would never had been valid with your as the main vehicle driver.

Insurance companies have recently been in the news and branded ’dysfunctional’ by the Office of Fair Trading. It’s relating to the high insurance premiums and especially the cost added after an accident, even if it wasn’t your fault. The problem is these companies don’t seem to be regulated by anyone and they can charge whatever they like. This needs to be sorted out as you simply have to have insurance so they know they have our arms twisted around our backs. As ever the Government are weak and feeble with this issue and succumb to the insurance companies as they did with the newspapers and their best buddies the Murdock family.

Apparently not-at-fault drivers are charge on average an extra £155 on their premiums due to the close relationships they have with the repair firms, allowing those firms to charge well over the odds for repairs. As always the motorist loses.

Jason Vines