Car Insurance - commuting to multiple places of work

FreddFfish

When searching for car insurance, what option do you pick if you're commuting to more than one place of work?

My sister is a self-employed music teacher who currently works at four different schools in a week. She finally decided to learn to drive after putting up with the rotten Birmingham trains for too long.

The problem is with the options on car use when going through websites like moneysupermarket.com. Can't choose Social, Domestic and Commuting to a single place of work, there's four. If I choose business use it asks for business miles not including commuting which would seem to be zero! What do I choose?

Also any ideas on lowering quotes for a 29yr old female first driver would be handy. Quotes over £1300 so far seem pretty steep.

Thank you.

olly300

If she is self-employed then her commute to her various places of work are business miles.

The odd thing about the comparison sites is they make you put in business miles and normal mileage separately. However when you eventually go through to the insurer themselves you will find they likely don't care and just want your total annual mileage.

BTW simplest thing is to guess how much of her mileage is to her places of work and how much will be social and domestic. Then go through to the insurer and see if they care at all.

dacouch

With most companies she will need Class One Business Use (It's sometimes called Class A or personal business).

I think most companies would expect her to put in as business mileage all of the miles she drives commuting to the various schools plus any other business miles. Some may allow her to deduct the mileage for the travelling to one of the schools

FreddFfish

Well I've played with the numbers a bit and oddly if you select business it often doesn't seem to make a lot of difference whether you weight the miles towards business or personal miles.

Anyway if commuting to the schools counts as business use, most of the miles will be for that as I think a few of them are outside Birmingham.

Thank you for your help folks, tis much appreciated.

MarcusB

We've just had a debate in work over this, Its surprising how many people dont realise that "normal" car insurance doesn't cover you except to and from your normal place of work. A colleague drove to a works training course and had a bump, and as it was business found he wasn't insured. But how many people do that without realising? I've always had to have class A business use, but have never been asked to proportion my mileage, Insurance companies have never been bothered.

lisyloo

I think you are right Marcus.
I'm sure a lot of people don't realise.
I must admmit, I have forgotten myself in the past.
It's obvious if you are travelling to a customer, but if you are just going to a different office or perhaps to a course, then you'd often consider it your own personal travel, so it's not immediately obvious to people.
We all need to be aware of the terms of our contracts however boring we might find it.

olly300

MarcusB wrote: »

I've always had to have class A business use, but have never been asked to proportion my mileage, Insurance companies have never been bothered.

Comparison sites make you proportion your business miles. I've yet to find an insurer who has when I've gone through to them however I've not checked every single insurer.

rev_henry

My mother is also a peripatetic music teacher and she has business cover. I think basically you're commuting cover would cover you going to the first school of the day, but not travelling between schools throughout the day, hence the need for the business class 1.