Telematics car insurance policy

[dicko]

I’m about to renew my Ford Ka annual insurance and I have been offered a Telematics policy around thirty pounds cheaper than last years quote.
Anybody know or have one of these? It involves having something fitted to your car to measure your driving behaviour like acceleration, braking cornering etc. These days I’m not in a hurry to get to any places and in a couple of years I’ll be finished driving for good. So what you think give it a try?

 

[sevenfourate]

If you were a teenager saving ‘thousands’ on your insurance - I would 👍

To save £30 at your age (And them tracing / checking / charging extra if you drive alot at peak times / erratically / or anything else that flags up) - I think I’d give it a miss…….

 

[dicko]

If you were a teenager saving ‘thousands’ on your insurance - I would 👍

To save £30 at your age (And them tracing / checking / charging extra if you drive alot at peak times / erratically / or anything else that flags up) - I think I’d give it a miss…….

Me too but this is something new to me thought it was to encourage young drivers to drive safely not old nearly eighty year olds

 

[sevenfourate]

^^^ Your black box isn’t impartial. It records everything. Good and bad. And reports it back to your insurer. If that ‘risk’ is worth £30 to you - go for it 😎 Personally I wouldn't dream of it…..

 

[si_c]

Also the headline quote may be £30 cheaper - for a year - but the policy has the possibility of raising the price of your insurance by far more than that per month if they deem your driving to be a "risk".

Under no circumstances would I give a company such access to data about myself voluntarily.

 

[Julia9054]

My son had one of these things n his first car. I remember a bloke coming round and removing the entire dashboard to fit it. It was supposed to send him monthly updates on his driving which he said it never did. Until he found them all in his spam folder!
The car has since been sold on. I’m guessing the gizmo is still in there, just deactivated.

 

[IanSmithCSE]

Good afternoon,

Me too but this is something new to me thought it was to encourage young drivers to drive safely not old nearly eighty year olds

It's the same logic, generate a premium/refuse to cover based on an individual's circumstances not an average.

As a general statement people do not like giving up their driving licences because they are too old to drive safely, people just don't want to believe that they are a danger on the roads.

By having a device recording that a driver always drives at 30 on roads that have 50mph speed limits the insurer can decide, yup, that guy is too old to still be driving.

Once they have decided that and cancelled your policy you then fall into the category of Have you ever had an insurance policy cancelled: Yes. Although this wording wasn't introduced to cover these circumstances insurers aren't queuing up to say it doesn't apply.

So there is a strong moral argument for having such a policy; The provision of independent advice on the suitablity of the policy holder to still be driving.

Bye

Ian

 

[dicko]

Well that clinches it I’m not going along the Telematic route at 78 at Christmas. The next best quote is £197 per annum fully comp from RAC and includes just about everything windscreen, personal injury, courtesy car, protected ncd etc and that’s with Mrs and my son on the policy too. MoneySupermarket far better quotes.

 

[sevenfourate]

My son had one of these things n his first car. I remember a bloke coming round and removing the entire dashboard to fit it. It was supposed to send him monthly updates on his driving which he said it never did. Until he found them all in his spam folder!
The car has since been sold on. I’m guessing the gizmo is still in there, just deactivated.

Most now are an effectively a ‘motion sensor’ - very small in size that get wired directly to the battery. And are then stuck onto the battery. If they happened to be the same colour as your battery - you’d struggle to notice its presence….

 

[slowmotion]

Insurance companies never, ever do any of their customers any favours. They are absolute spivs. Personally, I wouldn't invite one of their spies into my car unless I was eighteen or whatever.

 

[Drago]

There's always the risk that no matter how careful or skilled a driver you may think you are the black box will think otherwise, andnit could end up an expensive way to save the cost of a modest round of drunks.

I must agree completely with Worshipful Brother @slowmotion about insurers, although being a nice jewish boy I prefer "shysters" to "spivs."

 

[Gunk]

It involves having something fitted to your car to measure your driving behaviour like acceleration, braking cornering

No thanks, I’d rather just pay a bit more

 

[HMS_Dave]

My Daughter has one fitted with Marmalade (stupid name for anything that isn't a sugary fruit preserve). If she brakes too hard it flags up on her journey report, to which she calls them to explain why she had to as they see it as a minor negative and they will delete it if it is an acceptable reason. Minor infringements lead to warnings which is a warning telephone call, to a final warning letter and finally a cancellation of policy, 3 strikes and you're out. Read of that what you will. She is an exceptional driver and can prove it with these things, but even so, if i was still driving i think i'd rather extract my own teeth than to have one fitted.

 

[Julia9054]

My Daughter has one fitted with Marmalade

Marmalade wouldn't insure my son.
First question - are you a professional musician or sports person?
If you click yes - sorry, we can't insure you.

 

[Fastpedaller]

Going back 9 years, we had one on our car because our Daughter had just passed her test. It gave 'scores' which meant we were in competition to be the best driver . Myself, Wife (main driver) and daughter were the named drivers. One day we went into Norwich and I was the driver. When we returned home our Daughter was delighted when she looked at the stats and I'd been marked down for cornering - this was going round and round in the multi-story carpark! Two things were apparent - 1) It wasn't foolproof as there was nothing bad with my cornering, it was the design of the carpark and 2) although I was marked on that day as lower than normal, to be marked down as really bad would the driver be REALLY bad? I suspect if you were driving a very congested city route the scores could drop for no fault of your own, just traffic volume and collision avoidance. There have been cases highlighted on TV about 30 limit roads parallel to nearby dual carriageways resulting in the driver marked down as a speeder when they are on the dual carriageway and legally (safely) exceeding 30MPH! Tech isn't always great - ask the PO victims!