Beware Low Cost Learner Drivers Insurance

Adrian_Fitz

Following the usual investigation to get the best insurance to allow my eldest son to continue to learn to drive in a car we (his parents) own, I thought it was appropriate to share a warning on some of the lower cost insurances for learner drivers.

We wanted our son to try and build some "no claims bonus" whilst he was learning to drive, so as we had bought a car for our children to learn to drive in, we insured the car in my sons name.

Like every insurance or financial product, it always pays to check the small print......yes I know we all rarely do, but on this occasion I thought I would check.  To my amazement, quite a few of the lower cost policies have the following wording in: -


So, in effect the insurance we were about to purchase, whilst we had added ourselves as named drivers as we occasionally use the car, and for driving back from places when our son had driven with us, as the car was owned by us............the insurance was invalid!!

The second item to be aware of is that most learner driver policies are invalid at the moment the young driver passes their test.....................so I assume this would mean that if they were successful at passing their test, they couldn't drive home!!!

Beware low cost policies and the traps that are there.

Having been insured now for one year with one company, we were just about to renew............read the small print........."If you have a practical test booked in the next 40-days insurance cannot be provided"........................as you're starting to gather this is a minefield.

If anyone has found an insurer that doesn't have these traps in, then I'd love to hear as at present I cannot find a reasonable priced policy that doesn't have these issues in. 

GrumpyDil

If the car was purchased as a learner vehicle for your son why not register it in your son's name? Doesn't make him the legal owner and would avoid that specific insurance issue. 

And yes the reason that the learner policies work that way is that they are priced on the basis of the driver bring supervised which would not be the case from the instance they pass their test. 

user1977

As above, "registered keeper" and "owner" are not (necessarily) the same thing. Unless there is something else in the conditions about ownership?

Adrian_Fitz

Thanks for your replies.  As we bought the car for both our son (now 18) and our daughter a few months away from being 17 to be used to learn to drive, we decided that the best route was to keep the car in our registered ownership.  The car is to be shared not for one of them to own it.
I have now sorted the issue out by moving the insurance of the car into our Elephant multicar policy, but keeping our son as the main driver.  The cost of the "provisional license insurance" is about £70 p.a. more expensive, but the cost to then switch over after getting test is £1000 less, and of course all whilst gaining no claims bonus.