Car Insurance - Student on Teaching Practice

Rosie_Peacock

My daughter is doing a Postgraduate Certificate of Education and during the yeara she will be doing teaching practice at two different school. Her insurers have told her that as she is visiting two schools during the year she will have to be in sured as a 'Business User' and that will treble her premium. Her journeys will be from home to the relevant school. She will be carrying an adult passenger. Has anybody else had this experience?

lisyloo

Social, domestic and pleasure insurance covers only ONE permanent place of work.

So if you use your car for work to go anywhere else (training course, differnt office, customers) then you need business insurance.

Now I'm not sure if your daughter is engaged in "business" or "work" so you might want to clarigy that with the insurers,

As for trebbling, that doesn't sound right to me.
Usually my insurance increases very slightly or not at all, so again you need to clarigy how much this is going to cost.
If it's prohibitive, then she should look at other options,. public transport, taxi, could the other adult drive?
Sometimes for short term use it might be even cheaper to hire a car or get a taxi.

Personally I think it will probably cost very little, but you definitely should check it out.

Driving without insurance is a very serious offence, even if it is inadvertant and by that I mean that lots of people might take a trip to another office without realising they aren't insured.

snoringunicorn

Rosie_Peacock wrote: »

My daughter is doing a Postgraduate Certificate of Education and during the yeara she will be doing teaching practice at two different school. Her insurers have told her that as she is visiting two schools during the year she will have to be in sured as a 'Business User' and that will treble her premium. Her journeys will be from home to the relevant school. She will be carrying an adult passenger. Has anybody else had this experience?

This sounds completely ludicrous. It isn't as though she will be visiting both schools at the same time, is it? Consider this, if you had the same car insurance, worked at school A, then half way through the academic year, moved jobs to school B, you wouldn't even think about it, would you. Only one place of work, you just happen to have changed it. If she regulalry went to several schools, or visited business clients, that would be completely different, but SDP use (or SD&P plus commuting) should cover her on this with no problem. If I had advised someone in her position to take out Class 2 insurance when I worked for a broker I would have had my wrists slapped. I think she needs to speak to someone else at the insurers. I wouldn't accept what I had been told, it is patently ridiculous.

J

lisyloo

Only one place of work, you just happen to have changed it

This is a different scenario.
The permanent place of work has changed but at any point there is only one.

but SDP use (or SD&P plus commuting) should cover her on this with no problem.

I don't agree with you here (although it may have been the case with your employer).
It only covers one permament place of work.
These two places are more than one and are not permanent either.
I'm not sure whether what she is doing is "work" as it sounds like education or training to me, but I don't know on that score.

I think she needs to speak to someone else at the insurers. I wouldn't accept what I had been told, it is patently ridiculous.

I think it would be a good idea to check.
But at the end of the day that particualr insurer can set their own terms and they might not be the same as your employers.
I recently wanted business use to go to a customer site and was told my insurer did not offer it at all (Groupama) so I could not use that vehicle.

snoringunicorn

lisyloo wrote: »

This is a different scenario.
I don't agree with you here (although it may have been the case with your employer).
It only covers one permament place of work.

These two places are more than one and are not permanent either.

No problem, disagreement is good.

I know there is a lot of contention about the meaning of *commute*, all I can add is that in this circumstance, it would be a very, very pedantic insurer who would not cover this risk. I would have covered it in all iterations of working for a broker (three, plus direct company experience), and would have been told to cover it if I queried it with a superior.

Basically, I think what we are both saying (though we disagree on the answer!) is that your sister needs to speak to someone at the insurer, and preferably not someone who is the office junior.

J

lisyloo

snoringunicorn wrote: »

all I can add is that in this circumstance, it would be a very, very pedantic insurer who would not cover this risk.

Out of interest do you think it's very pedantic of my insurer not to let me add business insurance to travel to a client site for ONE day?
It was a motorbike BTW and not a car.

I must admit I was a bit suprised.
I renewing soon and I'll be adding class 1 up front for no cost.

snoringunicorn

lisyloo wrote: »

Out of interest do you think it's very pedantic of my insurer not to let me add business insurance to travel to a client site for ONE day?
It was a motorbike BTW and not a car.

I must admit I was a bit suprised.
I renewing soon and I'll be adding class 1 up front for no cost.

Ewww....Yes, I do but that is me personally, I don't have much experience of dealing with motorbike insurance. All I can say is that bike insurance is always more complicated than car insurance (so many used for courier work), so the terms of their policy wording may not have allowed them to do that. Car insurance policies can usually be varied infinitely by adding in various ready written clauses.

I do hope the OP daughter gets this sorted out, I personally hate these jobsworths in insurers who won't help out, and stonewall people. I worked with a lot of them in the past.

J

raskazz

Is it the case that she will posted at School A for however many months, and then posted at School B permanently for the period after that? Commuting use would be fine for that scenario.

If it's the case that she will be travelling to the different locations concurrently then it really does require business use. If it does treble her premium - which would be highly unusual - then I would advised her to check the cancellation terms of her policy and explore other insurers.