To what extent insurance companies share data among themselves?

movilogo

For questions like - do you have points/convictions in your license, have you made any claim in past 5 years, what/how long you hold license etc., I can't understand why they can't take the license number (for car insurance) and previous insurance policy# so that they can verify and directly get to know these answers? This will also prevent fraud to the first place.

Do they have any common database at all?

How do police check whether a car has an insurance or not. If you are showing them proof of insurance that means they have no database at all.

How can I see what data is stored about me on what their systems?

mattymoo

Data is shared by insurers via the Claims and Underwriting Exchange database or CUE for short. Google CUE + insurance for answers. They hold details of losses and declared convictions. It is used to prevent fraud.

The police check with the MID - Motor Insurers Database. This hold details of the vehicles covered by each policy and the renewal date. Police can contact the database managers and ask if a policy is in force for a certain vehicle. It takes a lot of time managing the database particularly for motor traders where the stock has to be regulararly declared to their insurer, often via an online system.

Make your approaches to the data protection officer of the databases and your insurer in order to see the info. A fee is normally charged as permitted under the DPA.

movilogo

Does it mean getting insurance from who do not provide claim info to CUE is beneficial?

brazilianwax

I smell a rat............

Astaroth

Not all insurers use CUE to its full extent, legally there are very very few vehicles that dont have to go onto the MID database. An insurance company only sees the insurer and policy number on a MID check for people not insured within their Group, for those that are they get to see most the details of the policy. I believe the police can see all the details for all vehicles.

The other issue with MID is that for large fleet policies it is up to the company not the insurer to load the data of the vehicles and drivers (as appropriate) onto the database.

A shared database is like any other... it is expensive to get licences to view the data (so insurers dont give access to it to everybody) and it is only as good as the data that is put in it and inevitably mistakes are made. The police will cross check your motor certificate against the MID entry (remember people may also be driving under the "driving other cars" extention of their own insurance and not under the insurance on the vehicle in questions) - if there are any discrepancies they will contact the insurance company on the certificate the driver has produced (normally the insurers counter fraud department for verification that it is a genuine certificate and the policy is in force)

In addition to this almost all insurance policies have a clause to say they will share information with other insurers and there are a number of "memberships" an insurer can have to facilitate this on top of databases like MID and CUE