Car insurance for test driving?

EJennyJ

Is insurance needed before you can test drive a car you might want to buy? And how does my learner driver son get insurance to enable him to test drive a car either after or before he has passed his driving test, without insurance? He wants to buy one before he has passed but his father and I think that he will not be able to test drive it because he will have no insurance.

How does he arrange for his own insurance if he hasn't passed his test and doesn't actually own a car yet? We've heard of non-car-owners insurance, but if that is what he'd need, would he have to pay for a whole year's insurance for what may only turn out to be a month or two before he passes his test and buys a car? And even once he has passed his test, how do you get insurance for a test drive - or is that covered by the insurance of the person/trade who owns the car at the time of the test drive? Not sure how it works - in our day, you just test drove a car - as soon as you'd decided to buy a particular car, then you rang up (now it's all online of course) and arranged insurance for that car.

Hope someone has an answer for us - we've searched online and none of the sites we've visited seem to address this specific question, surely we are not the only people to ask it?

Billy_Bullocks

He is unlikely to get insurance that allows him to drive other vehicles. Can't dad test drive it for him?

EJennyJ

well he could, of course, but I personally wouldn't want to buy a car I hadn't driven!! Could put him on our insurance of course, as a provisional driver - apparently the AA do cover for that, but think that only allows him to drive our cars... looks like he may just have to wait until he has passed.

forgotmyname

Buy from a garage he maybe covered for the test drive. But you will need to ask first because they may have minimum age limits or x amount of driving experiemce first.

He wont normally be covered to drive other cars due to his age. Day insurance may also exclude him due to age and lack of experience.

Even when he has passed his test he probably wont be covered for other cars.

Aretnap

Simple answer is to buy from a dealer who will have a trade policy which covers test drives.

If he wants to buy privately it's a pain. He won't get driving other cars cover by being a named driver on your policy, and even if he was the policyholder most insurers don't offer it at all to young drivers. He could try a 1 day policy (Googe short term car insurance) but I'm not sure how easy they are to get as a young/learner driver. Could ask the seller to add him as a named driver to his own policy but could be expensive, or a straight decline depending on the insurer. Sitting in the passenger seat while Dad drives may be the easiest option.

Xyzzy

Search for wearemarmalade (I'm not allowed to post the link!) they do 90 day learner driver insurance. For a test drive if the seller had trade plates they may cover you, the seller should be able to tell you

System

EJennyJ wrote: »

Is insurance needed before you can test drive a car you might want to buy?

Not sure how it works - in our day, you just test drove a car - as soon as you'd decided to buy a particular car, then you rang up (now it's all online of course) and arranged insurance for that car.

Hope someone has an answer for us - we've searched online and none of the sites we've visited seem to address this specific question, surely we are not the only people to ask it?

It is illegal to drive a car on the road without insurance. End of. No ifs, buts or exclusions.

In your sons case he isn't going to be able to get any. A dealership may have insurance that covers them for test drives but it may not cover learners. The two options are:

1) Get a family member who has cover for any vehicle to do a test drive with your son in it as a passenger.

2) Get the seller to go on to some private land (and no, supermarket car parks are not private land) where your son can then drive the car himself without insurance.

"In our day" we tended not to give much of a monkeys and most test drives from private buyers were done without insurance. Back then though it wasn't all computerised so it was easier to get away with it.

Car_54

EJennyJ wrote: »

Not sure how it works - in our day, you just test drove a car - as soon as you'd decided to buy a particular car, then you rang up (now it's all online of course) and arranged insurance for that car.

Unless "your day" was before 1930 you needed to be insured.

kmb500

EJennyJ wrote: »

Is insurance needed before you can test drive a car you might want to buy? And how does my learner driver son get insurance to enable him to test drive a car either after or before he has passed his driving test, without insurance? He wants to buy one before he has passed but his father and I think that he will not be able to test drive it because he will have no insurance.

How does he arrange for his own insurance if he hasn't passed his test and doesn't actually own a car yet? We've heard of non-car-owners insurance, but if that is what he'd need, would he have to pay for a whole year's insurance for what may only turn out to be a month or two before he passes his test and buys a car? And even once he has passed his test, how do you get insurance for a test drive - or is that covered by the insurance of the person/trade who owns the car at the time of the test drive? Not sure how it works - in our day, you just test drove a car - as soon as you'd decided to buy a particular car, then you rang up (now it's all online of course) and arranged insurance for that car.

Hope someone has an answer for us - we've searched online and none of the sites we've visited seem to address this specific question, surely we are not the only people to ask it?

Garages have their own insurance policies that allow people to test drive the car. Private sellers won't have this so only look at trade dealers.
However I cannot imagine that any garage will let a person test drive if they have not passed their test.


Why does he need to buy the car before he passes his test? And does he even need to drive it? If it's his first car he wouldn't know what car is best anyway. No offence.
My parents bought me a car out of the blue, I wasn't expecting them to and they just came home one day with a Fiat Panda on the driveway. Not a car I had ever particularly wanted but I was just thrilled to have the independence, and it happened to drive very nicely in my opinion.


But, now that I have a much better car, looking back on it, when I drive it every now and again (my parents still have it), there's no question that it drives terribly. It feels completely disconnected from the road and it's really loose, I didn't feel in control at all. Lol

Le_Kirk

If he wants to test drive it before having a full driving licence, would he want the dealer (if he went that way) to provide and fit L plates?

Ebe_Scrooge

Can't really add much here, other than to echo what's already been said. The simplest option is to get Dad to test drive the car, or buy from a dealer who has insurance in place.


The caveats being - if Dad does the test drive, make sure his insurance covers him to drive other cars. 20 years ago, pretty much any full comp policy automatically covered driving other cars. These days, there are plenty that still do, but it's not automatically included on all. Check the policy documents. And if you go down the dealer route, check that their insurance covers young/learner drivers.


End of the day, if you get caught driving with no insurance you're in a whole heap of trouble - not to mention the eye-watering premiums you'll be paying for years to come. It's really not worth risking it.