Young drivers in the UK will have to grapple with high insurance premiums for a longer period. This unpopular trend is likely to persist, despite of a thirty-six percent drop in road traffic accident cases involving young drivers. Insurance companies have for a long period, singled out young automobile drivers, as the riskiest category. Figures from the Department of Transport revealed that the number of road accidents involving these drivers fell from twenty-four percent in 2009, to twenty-three percent in 2010. Irrespective of this, insurers are still adamant that premium rates will remain high.
Road Traffic Accidents - Claim for Compensation!
Currently, young drivers in the UK have to fork out roughly £3,600 annually as insurance premium. Drivers between the ages of 17 and 22, who opt to pay premium installments, end up paying over £ 500 monthly. The government issues over four hundred thousand new licenses to young people annually. These drivers face annual premiums of almost £6,000. Few of them can afford to pay such high rates of insurance. Consequently, the Motor Insurers Bureau estimates that twenty percent of young drivers on the road are uninsured.
Insurance experts claim that drivers risk on the road tends to reduce at the age of 23-25. Accordingly, insurers adjust premium rates for drivers in the mid twenties to late forties. However, young ones who might put off driving until they are in their mid twenties, to avoid high insurance costs, face the risk of inexperience on the road. At the moment, high premium stipends do not seem to deter teenagers from driving. Parents are willing to sign up their kids on their auto insurance policies to avoid high premiums.
It is highly unlikely that insurance premiums for young car drivers will reduce in the nearby future. Road traffic accident statistics do not seem to favor the youth. The Automobile Association estimates that two people are killed and sixteen injured on a daily basis, due to crashes involving under25s. One out of four road crash casualties is usually a young driver or their passengers. Most injured victims end up paying more to a personal injury lawyer, hospitals and pharmacies before they obtain full compensation. What makes it worse is that only twelve percent of drivers on the road are under this age bracket.
Insurance companies receive constant accident compensation claim requests from victims of these crashes. Road safety advocates estimate that one out of five new drivers is involved in an accident, within half a year of passing their driving test. New drivers are more likely to be involved in collisions, during the first two years of their stint on the roads. This makes insurance companies wary of young ones, prompting the high premium rates.
Nevertheless, some car insurance companies are notorious for overcharging policyholders. The UK Office of Fair Trading recently launched an inquiry of the private motor insurance market, after allegations of fraud increased exponentially. Investigations revealed that unscrupulous insurers were selling clients information to no-win attorneys, car garages and car rental firms. This resulted in steep premium costs throughout 2010.