Whilst I do agree with you in theory, paying in one lump sum obviously makes the most financial sense in the long run, paying in instalments can be convenient if you don't mind paying a little extra for the privilege. It also has the advantage that if at anytime you want to cancel the policy, you can just halt the direct debit, rather than wrestle the cash from the insurers cold, dead hands.
Apart from the 'privacy issues' that this causes, one of the reasons that the co. that developed these GPS/timing/data gadgets came up against is when to download the data. Without an interlock to the car's fuel filler they couldn't guarantee the car wasn't being refuelled whilst the data download was going on..... (BANG!)
And before you say it, yes, I hate it too - it'll put my insurance bill up by a =A3fortune every year, and based on this fact, I can only guess that for the insurance companies, it IS the future! (Well, their future, anyway!)
Please remind me not to get a quote from the NU next summer.....
It's not really that from my experience. It worked out like complete shit for me personally, and wife and two teenagers, one girl, one boy, both 19 and 20 respectively. The wife's not quite that young, god-damn.
I got an extensive quote, and I think the guy wasn't relying on me writing everything he said down. You get a 'grace' number of miles per month, which is fair enough, but miles after that during the day were expensive, anything up to 25pence a mile, and at night, even more (for the young uns.)
I did a lot of calculations and found I'd be paying probably triple what I pay currently for driving insurance for us all in total (although the young uns pay their own way for it, but in total, it's a lot.)
Sniffs to me like a way for Norwich Union to make a lot of profit, and that was my instant reaction when I heard of 'GPS'. Keep in mind that GPS can also track speed, and already you've got possible issues with "well he was going at 80mph :-O" in a non-speeding trial in court. Bad idea overall.
Sorry, my fault, I was investigating PAYG quotes on 3 seperate cars, my sons, daughters, then my wife and myself on one car. The daughter & son's car was an absolute joke price-wise, although on the plus side I think it would make them think thoroughly before driving. It was more per mile for insurance (as I calculated at the time) than it was for petrol, seemed a bit over the top.
As for my wife and I on the one car, I don't know how they would differentiate between drivers, good point though!
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