5 July
2010
(source: in-house)
First Time Car Insurance
If you want to buy
cheap young driver insurance right now, we would
recommend going to our article on young
drivers car insurance in our
'Buyers Guide' section that offers
the most useful advice on this.
The key problem when attempting to obtain first time car insurance,
especially for those under 25, is the price of cover. The new driver,
particularly the young new driver, is much more at risk of having an
accident and consequently the premium has to reflect this.
There are various tactics that will help to reduce costs when buying first time car insurance and the more of these that
you can apply in your case, the lower the cost of the premium you can
expect to pay.
Clearly, a low car insurance group car is a good starting point. The
old 1-20 rating system has been scrapped in favour of the Thatchem car
insurance group 1-50 rating. You can check any car's rating online and
should ideally aim to buy a car with a rating of under 10 if you are
looking to save on first time car
insurance.
You then should keep the car as it is without 'upgrading' it to your
own specifications as this invariably increases the cost of cover.
Clearly, if you use price comparison systems to find first time car insurance, by checking lots of
prices, you maximise your opportunities to cut the cost of cover. Many
first time drivers will accept a high excess and a somewhat basic level
of cover to keep down the price of their car insurance. That is not to
say that you should automatically select the cheapest-priced cover on a
price comparison system without knowing what you're getting. Do check
over the cover to ensure it's adequate.
Steps that will cut costs of first
time car insurance include
improving the vehicle's security. This might include on-board
Thatchem-approved devices and off-road secure parking overnight.
You can also make yourself a lower risk by passing an advanced driving
test while adding an over-25 as a second driver is helpful too.
If you expect a low annual mileage, capping that will also drive down
costs.
If you would like to use a first
time car insurance specialist broker (instead of, or as well as, a car
insurance comparison system), Endsleigh is a good choice (link below).
What we do not advise is taking out third party only car insurance or
using a practice known as 'fronting' whereby an older person -
typically a parent - alleges that they are the primary driver and the
new driver is insured as a named driver. The latter practice renders
the policy void in an accident while the former leads to no cover for
personal or passenger injury if hit by an uninsured drvier or where
liability is with yourself.
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