Car insurance & medical conditions

Katykat

We have been with our present insurers for about 6 years. Each year they send us a renewal quote and I check against other companies, up to now it’s been the best so we renew. Recently we had a non fault accident, our car is under repair right now. I was checking through the documents again today and noticed that the full ( not the summary) document said we had no declared medical conditions. Now, at the time of taking the insurance out, that was correct, but 4 years ago my husband had open heart surgery to correct a faulty valve. He now takes medication. After the operation he was told he could drive after 3 months. I also now take medication for arthritis. Neither of us have ever been advised not to drive or to inform DVLA of our conditions. But I never thought to inform the insurers. Have we done wrong here & if we tell them now, will it void our insurance ?

Grey_Critic

If it says so in the FULL Terms and Conditions then you do need to tell them. None of the conditions should have any effect on your premium. As we grow older we all suffer from health problems so do not worry about it. A friend of mine lost an eye earlier this year, he had to inform both the DVLA and the insurer but is now legally driving again.

dacouch

Insurers are generally only concerned about medical conditions the DVLA need to be notified about and / or which they restrict your licence for.

I think you will find your policy shows no medical conditions for the simple reason that your Insurer don't regard it as a medical condition as the DVLA are not interested in it

Car_54

dacouch is right.


I suspect that when they say "declared" conditions they mean declared to the DVLA.

Aretnap

An insurance policy that required you to inform the insurer of every medical condition you had would require you to tell them every time you felt a bit woozy with a touch of flu, or that now you're middle aged your knees and back give you a bit of discomfort from time to time. I can't imagine that any insurer would want to know about those sort of things. So every insurance policy I've ever seen only requires you to inform them of a medical condition if its also one that you have to tell the DVLA about.

Katykat

Thank you folks. That’s reassured me. You can’t be too careful with insurers. We have declared everything on our travel insurance because you hear such stories about insurers refusing to pay up because something wasn’t declared. I’ve been onto the DVLA page and both our conditions state that we don’t have to inform them, so now I’m happy about the car insurance.