So......an end to cheaper car insurance for women

boyse7en

jase1 wrote: »

Yes, but if that is the case, why is it that individual policies do not seem to take this into account (as per my post above)?

I assume your referring to "I played around with the figures on confused.com and changing a £500 supermarket "meeting" to a crash that wrote off a £20,000 car resulted in exactly the same quote"

But the only fact you are changing is the cost of your individual accident history, not the accident history of an entire age-related sector. It's not the cost of your particualr accident that is affecting your premium, it is the cost of all the accidents from all teh drivers in your particular age sector.

In an ideal world, insurers would be able to calculate your individual risk (in some kind of sensing-the-future, Minority Report, way, perhaps) but until they start employing soothsayers on a regular basis, all they can do is to catagorise your risk by broad sectors, such as age, sex, location, etc.

Strider590

Inactive wrote: »

I have a friend that works for a recovery company, he tells me that over 70% of accidents that he attends involve young, mainly male drivers.

Many not even involving other vehicles.

How many cars does he pick up that have been nudged in a carpark, or involved in a minor rear end shunt, or an exchange of paint, or wingmirrors smashed??

Im actually shocked that it's not more than 70% though, i'd have expected younger drivers to have much more serious (tow truck requiring) accidents

Lum

In many ways the cost of an accident doesn't affect future risk, just the type of accident.

If, though your bad driving, you skid and crash into the side of someone's 1983 Ford Escort 1.3 and the insurance pays out £100 for the car and £1000 in whiplash, you are no better than someone else of a similar profile who skidded through their bad driving crashed into the side of someone's brand new Bugatti Veyron, which had to be replaced at a cost of £850,000 and £1000 in whiplash.

They are not going to say, "oh this guy's less risk because he only crashes into old bangers", they are going to say "This guy is a risk because he's crashed into someone before. On average it costs, say, £4000 to repair a car" and base your premiums on this.

jase1

Actually that is a very good point, well made Lum. Duly noted.

Lum

Strider590 wrote: »

How many cars does he pick up that have been nudged in a carpark, or involved in a minor rear end shunt, or an exchange of paint, or wingmirrors smashed??

Im actually shocked that it's not more than 70% though, i'd have expected younger drivers to have much more serious (tow truck requiring) accidents

If the car is in any way driveable then a youngster is more likely to chance it and drive home anyway, wheras an older person is more likely to be cautious, or have a family/kids with them and thus choose the tow truck option.

Lirin

I would easily argue- I don't have any statistics- that women have more accidents than men. Amongst my female friends, there's a lot of fender benders, minor bumps, scrapes, etc, whereas most of the men I know who've had an accident- it's usually a biggie. While women have more accidents, mens are usually more expensive to repair. Women tend to be more nervous/dippy, whereas men tend to be aggressive/cocky. Again, a sweeping generalisation, but then, something has to be used as a factor to even come up with pricing.
There was something to that effect on one of the news channels this morning, I think.
Gender should maybe play a part, as genetics and life define different overall attitudes in gender.

Lum

Another thing to consider is that on average men do more miles per year than women which even if everything else were equal means greater exposure to risk.

Expect to see more weight being given to mileage, and more limited mileage policies in addition to more weight being given to stereotypically male occupations such as bricklayer.

Lirin

Did catch the end of the news in the work van earlier- some expert was being quizzed on the black box ideas again- to measure mileage and style of driving. Can't imagine it being introduced that easily.

Lum

A lot of people will resist that idea. I'd likely benefit from it as I have a company car, so my private fun car doesn't actually do much these days, but I don't want my movements recorded on principle.

There used to be a company that did this for younger drivers, they had to agree not to drive after 11 with penalties imposed by the black box if they do.

Exemplar

Luckily for my personal car insurance (not the Mini in another post) I had protected NCB. Last March 2nd hit black ice doing about 35 on a road, spun, went into a ditch, rolled 3 times and flipped out of the ditch, went in the air and landed so hard on the roof that it trapped all the doors shut... ouch! 4 people in the car! Luckily only 1 claim against me as only 1 person injured (broken arm and collar bone). However point is I am made out to be a 'criminal' by insurance companies for a genuine accident! Lets be like Russia 'state pays for all accidents, no need for insurance'...