Van SORN but not declared to insurance company

Grumpy_chap

redped said:

This isn't relevant to the OP, but a number of replies here say that a SORNed vehicle is still covered by insurance. There's an ongoing thread on a Z4 forum I frequent, where some people have been told by their insurance companies that their cover isn't valid if their car is SORNed - https://z4-forum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=132258
If anyone's got a SORNed vehicle, then it'd be worth checking that it's still covered by any insurance which has been taken out for it.

I wonder whether the devil is in the detail on insurance cover not applying to a car under SORN?

It seems entirely reasonable that an insurer would invalidate any elements of a claim that come under those parts of the policy affected by the car being SORN. 

So, if the car is being used (other than to a pre-booked MOT which is permitted for a SORN car) or damaged while parked on the road, the insurer could entirely reasonably look to decline the claim as the risk should not be there.

If the car is parked on a driveway or in a garage or other SORN-permitted location, then the insurer should (IMO) still cover theft, criminal damage, certain types of accidental damage (tree falling on the car), fire.  I can even see that these locations would be subject to the policy so, if the policy is for the car at policy-holder's home address and states normally kept on driveway, that is where the car should be. 

It would be a change to risk (and therefore reasonable decline insurance) if the car was at a different address and in a garage en-block for example - by not being the policy-holder's home there is no "checking" on the car.  If the car is on SORN on driveway at home, the policy holder will know within 24-hours (usually) if some incident has befallen the car.  If the car is in a storage location away from the home, the policy holder might potentially be making a claim "car damaged / stolen / whatever at some time between September and April".  That lack of detail on when an incident occurred reduces the insurance company ability to recover their losses - either CCTV or similar evidence to identify a guilty party, or recover the vehicle in the event of a theft.