Insurance for car we share

lynn_m21

My husband and I have one car which we share. We are buying a new one. I will drive it more often than him, but only locally. If we go a long distance he usually drives, so he may do more miles than me.

Anyone know who should be the main driver? We both have clean licenses. Our current car is in his name (as we sold my small car when we decided to manage with one car), so I haven't had insurance in my own name for about 18 months, am named driver on his insurance.

Advice / thoughts appreciated.

paddedjohn

Who is the main driver on the other car? do you have any ncd you can use on the new car?

forgotmyname

You use the car daily where he doesnt. Your the main driver.

lynn_m21

We currently have one car (his), which we will be selling when we get the new one.

I use the car more times than him but not daily, I cycle to work and use the car 2 -4 times a week, sometimes less. He will drive it 1 - 2 times but longer distances.

Jamie1981

Who's the new car going to be registered to?

Me personally, I would insure it with the main driver being the name of the person on the V5C.

lynn_m21

Jamie, we will register it to whoever we decide is going to hold the insurance. The difficulty is deciding who the main driver is, the vehicle really is shared.

I have tried asking an insurance company but they could only give me a very wooly answer. I imagined lots of people would be in the situation, but thinking about it, most of my friends have two cars or just one driver.

1jim

I would run both sets of details on a comparison website and choose which is cheaper

But if you use the car 4 times a week and him 2 times a week, you are main driver

Aretnap

The most important rule is "don't take the p!ss". If your thought process is "I know I'm going to be the main driver but it works out much cheaper to put him down... Is this OK?" then you already know the answer. If you're genuinely unsure of who will be the main driver because you'll be driving more often but less distance then so long as you can justify why your interpretation was a reasonable one your insurer can't penalise you for the fact that your interpretation might not be the same as theirs. They have a duty to ask clear questions, and for someone in that situation "who will be the main driver" is not a clear question.

In practice I suspect that with a husband and wife sharing one car it's very unlikely that an insurer would delve too deeply into who drove it most often anyway, especially if there was only a small difference between the risk profiles of the two people. They're looking for blatant abuse of the system, particularly parents insuring their children's cars in their own names, which is easy to prove - not in arguing about which of you drives it 3 days a week and who drives it 4.

Lum

Husband and wife is unlikely to be an issue, unless there's an enormous age gap.

Which of you currently has the NCB? Probably should keep them as the main driver. If you both have lots of NCB then alternate yearly in order to keep both sets of NCB alive.

lynn_m21

Thank you all.

I will find out about the NCB as that may well be the deciding factor, current car is in husband name as is insurance.