Got rear ended !!

Adstar · Post by **Adstar** » 04 Jul 2006, 08:33

Again. Are you not just obsolving people of their social responsability? And how long until fuel becomes an even more black market industry therefore removing insurance from motoring almost completely!

It's not that I don't agree with you and the fact that there are far too many uninsured drivers gettign away with murder, almost literally! I just think taking away the personal responsability for someone to insure themselves, and/or which ever car they are driving, is they way forward.

Homer · Post by **Homer** » 04 Jul 2006, 18:15

Insurance is one of the biggest costs of owning a car.

It's also the most tempting (and easiest) to get away with not doing.

But if you are not insured then why bother with tax or MOT? And if you don't bother registering then the computer can't send you a fine. That pesky ANPR becomes a problem so you have some false plates made up or steal someone else's.

If basic 3rd party insurance was included in fuel duty you would reduce the temptation for these other crimes.

You are worried you will be paying for people who avoid paying fuel duty? Well you do exactly that already, you pay for uninsured drivers through your own insurance premium. The insurance companies all pay into a big pot which is used to compensate victims of uninsured drivers.

The fact is it is the socially responsible who have the most to gain since the proportion of vehicles not contributing to the pot will reduce. Plus you will no longer be in danger of being hit by an uninsured driver.

And who knows we might even get some proper aportioning of blame instead of knock-for-knock. It's currently to an insurance company's benefit to find both parties partly to blame, they pay out half the claim and rake some back from both party's NCD.

Adstar · Post by **Adstar** » 05 Jul 2006, 08:40

Its actually starting to make a little more sense. Thinking about it. The more you drive the more open to risk you are and the more fuel you should use. And everyone needs fuel in theory!

My only problem now.. other than the fact I still totally disagree with absolving people of their own responsabilities through life, is that the cost will be manufactured by insurance companies and hijacked by the government.

There is no way to differentiate anyones no claims/risk reducing bonus, no way to determine what car you have, what extra security you have, so we will all have to be charged the same rate as the biggest risks on the road. The govrnment already tax our insurance.. but it wouldn;t take much to sneakily raise the percentage (fair enough they could do that anyway and most people wouldn't notice).

One other side issue. If you link the basic 3rd party cover to fuel duty, are you not discouraging the government from pushing for greener fuels? They are already taking a VERY inncorrect and blinkered view on simple things like veg oil, and the tax breaks on LPG and Bio Diesel are slowly reducing.. how do you insure a soley electric vehicle?

8304 · Post by **8304** » 05 Jul 2006, 09:44

adstar quote:

"There is no way to differentiate anyones no claims/risk reducing bonus, no way to determine what car you have, what extra security you have, so we will all have to be charged the same rate as the biggest risks on the road. The govrnment already tax our insurance.. but it wouldn;t take much to sneakily raise the percentage (fair enough they could do that anyway and most people wouldn't notice"

all charged the same rate as the biggest risks on the road:

low risk drivers would see their premiums rise

High risk drivers would see their premiums fall

(as this system woould make the cot of insurance the average cost in the industry....

i think?

but its not going to happen anyway.........

Adstar · Post by **Adstar** » 05 Jul 2006, 10:15

Of course it wont happen! But it ws an interesting discussion on the potential alternatives to a system that is obviously open to abuse.

And yes you are right, in the event that costs are averaged out based on the 'communal risk', high risk drivers, those with more expensive or more powerful or less secure cars, would pay less and low risk drivers, or those with smaller, cheaper, less powerful cars, would pay more. The main reason I would see that 'people' wouldn't like this as a new system.

One option could be somethign like the Tax disc but for insurance? I haven't thought out the ins/outs of the system, but I'm sure a visable display of your cars insurance status would go a long way to discouraging 'no-insurance'.

8304 · Post by **8304** » 05 Jul 2006, 11:46

yes couldnt agree more - ive though this before - some sort of visual disc to show if it is insured or not

but people may try to nick them but i spose there are always down sides......

Allanxantia · Post by **Allanxantia** » 05 Jul 2006, 12:03

Fuel duty covering 3rd party could be scary when you think about it. My other car is an Impreza turbo which I have wated for years but could only afford to insure it a couple of years ago. I often think to myself that if I had this car when I was young I wouldn't be here now.

This would allow high risk, convicted, young drivers to drive whatever they want.

I think our insurance system works. Only careful or low risk drivers can legally drive fast cars and that is a good thing.

Adstar · Post by **Adstar** » 05 Jul 2006, 12:54

I think you hit the nail on the head with "legally" being able to drive cars. You, like me, waited until you could afford a car of power and performance.

Not everyone will wait, and not everyone is legal. The advantage of a visual, display is that if there were any police left patrolling the roads/streets they woudl be able to spot anything suspicious easily.

The advantage of a fuel based insurance would be your high performace and uneconomical car of higher risk would use more fuel.. therefore you'd end up paying more for insurance.

I wouldn't want a fuel based system.. it would scare the pants off me too!

nick · Post by **nick** » 05 Jul 2006, 14:04

The major flaw in any system that uses eg an insurance sticker in the windscreen, or numberplate recognition to try to detect uninsured drivers, is the wording of UK law. It all comes down to the 1988 Road Traffic Act again - it requires the driver to be insured, not the car. Just because DVLA records show that somebody somewhere has taken out a policy to cover them for that particular car does not mean any other person sat behind the wheel of that car at any given time is also insured.

Linking insurance policies to a particular car or reg number doesn't really prove anything, at least not sufficiently to convict anyone based solely on that evidence alone. Driving without MOT or road tax is far more clear cut, it is the car which needs to be taxed or MOT'd, so its very easy to prove this.

Only a total overhaul of the Road Traffic Act can really change this.

Ross_K · Post by **Ross_K** » 06 Jul 2006, 00:18

Adstar wrote:One option could be somethign like the Tax disc but for insurance? I haven't thought out the ins/outs of the system, but I'm sure a visable display of your cars insurance status would go a long way to discouraging 'no-insurance'.

Nah. We've had insurance discs in Ireland for a while now.

Good idea in theory, but not foolproof. For instance, if you cancel your policy you are supposed to send back your disc. Some people will cancel a policy and keep the disc on the windscreen for decoration - so to speak.

They're are easy to forge with a scanner and colour printer anyway. As long as you didn't plough your car into a bus stop full of grannies, chances are nobody would know. Some companies have holograms on the disc to prevent copying, but most don't

And of course, cars registered outside the country with little or no insurance can't be detected easily either.

The NCT (MOT equivalent) means you have a third disc on your windscreen for that too...

nick · Post by **nick** » 06 Jul 2006, 11:35

I've often thought there should at least be some standardisation of insurance certificates. The one I get from NFU Mutual looks as though somebody's run it off MS Word on an old laser printer in their back bedroom!

Incidently I saw a modded Golf Gti get wheelclamped for having no road tax this morning. The cost of the alloys and bodykit alone would have probably paid the road tax for about 10 years....

Adstar · Post by **Adstar** » 06 Jul 2006, 13:07

I have another sugestion. this is a luter 'far fetched' and probably somethign for the intermediate future. But as we are gettign all big brother with the driving now, cameras everywhere and black boxes on the car, why not have a finger print or iris recognistion system on the ignition somewhere.

The car would have to scan to check who you were and then compare an international database which recorded the cars you were allowed to drive.

It would mean less flexability, in that you couldn;t jump in yoru mates car with his permission. You wudl have to notify the insurance databse first who would be able to verify the stae of your insurance.

No valid insurance the car doesn't start!

Yes, I have realised there is one MAJOR flaw, my car doesn't have the electric gadets required for this to work, and I doubt yours do either, and probably ever will. They could be retro fitted to make them compliant?

But I ws just thnking that if our cars are going to be able to grass us up for breaking draconian speed limits (or the sensible ones!) then why shouldn;t our cars be able to decided who can or can't drive them!

Ross_K · Post by **Ross_K** » 06 Jul 2006, 14:16

You're never gonna get rid of the problem of uninsured drivers. There will always be a hardcore group of people who just don't want to spend the money - just like you'll always have drunk drivers who don't care about their actions. Crushing uninsured/drunk driver's cars would be nice, but if someone's going around in a £100 banger registered in a false name they're not going to see that as much of an incentive to go legit. And there are only so many people you can throw in jail... Database technology would be the way to go eventually, but as ANPR shows a lot of work would need to be done first. Insurance companies would only go so far in that regard anyway before the costs started eating into their profits - and that's when the innocent driver would be stung for higher premiums.

The police are next to useless in my experience unless an uninsured driver causes an injury or death. They don't want to know about mere car damage...

andmcit · Post by **andmcit** » 13 Jul 2006, 14:34

IT'S NOT EXACTLY IN LONDON BUT I'VE JUST SEEN A S2 PERFECT ESTATE TAILGATE IN SILVER FOR £60 +VAT

You DO fancy a run down to the sunny seaside town of Swansea!?

It's mint as I've just seen it still on a W plate 1.8 16v [it's complete with minor scuffing on the back bumper bits but nothing bad!] in a yard called Pic-up Spares in Llansamlet, Swansea - www.pic-upspares.co.uk/

they'll remove it for you and probably courier it too for more ££'s...

Andrew