Temporary car insurance cover - Under 21 or Over?
Over the last few years, temporary car insurance has become extremely popular because drivers have recognised that they now are more at risk on the roads with the ever increasing number of new drivers and careless ones. Consequently the number of companies offering temporary insurance cover has soared and has made getting cheap temporary car insurance easy.
With a larger pool of insurers providing temporary car insurance now (or short term car insurance as some call it), the competition has increased so much that all companies are fighting to attract new customers. This means that the temporary car insurance quote that each company provides has to be really competitive for them to lure customers into purchasing it otherwise they will be losing their potential clients to their own competitors. And that's not something which businesses like to do! Therefore, in order to quote for affordable or cheap temporary insurance premiums, other things are being compromised along the way.
What once used to be standard cover have now been split by individual insurance companies and tailored according to what they think is essential to remain competitive. To understand this more clearly, let's ask a simple question - why do people take out car insurance in the first place? The obvious answer to this rather lame question is to protect your car against accidental or malicious damage. So every driver should be able to get this type of insurance cover (even if it was not required by law), right? However there are no insurers in the market at the moment willing to cover young people under 21 for temporary car insurance.
Not only do these young drivers face higher premiums when they set out to insure their cars but they are being deprived of temporary insurance cover because of their age! It leaves us to think about the flaws in this rigid and unfocused motoring law system here in the UK, doesn't it?
As a matter of fact, it encourages young people who haven't reached 21 yet to drive without car insurance. Just like my friend Tim who wanted to drive his brother's car for the weekend to go see his girlfriend up north in Manchester but couldn't buy temporary insurance because he was only 19 and had to chance it unfortunately. Luckily he was not caught though.
