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Delivery Driver + Insurance


Vio

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Earlier this year I was paying a reasonable £900 ish insurance on my 1.0 Mk2F. Two crashes later I got a 1.0 6n as I figured insurance would be reasonably cheap, and my premium went up to £1800. But turns out this wasn't primarily because of the crashes (both of which were non-fault and I still have 2 years NCD) - it was because I changed my job from a student to a delivery driver, and apparently Churchill "has big discounts for students", or so they said.

Insurance quotes have been hell for me since. Another 1.6 Nissan I looked at would be £2100, a 1.8 Audi would be £2300. Recently a co-worker has put his gorgeous 2.0 MG ZT up for sale, and I got a quote on it for £3200, which I kinda was expecting.

But then I changed my job from "Fast Food Delivery Driver" to "Fast Food Processor" and I got quotes on the MG starting at £1500. That's £300 less than what I'm currently paying on my 6n.

Now I work at Domino's, and I have third party insurance with them whilst I'm on the clock - so if I get in an accident whilst on a delivery and I'm at fault, Domino's insurance pays the third party. If they're at fault, their own insurance pays me. I don't think I'm covered by Churchill whilst at work anyway as I only have SDP atm.

As this is a public forum, let's say that hypothetically speaking, if I spoke to my other driver colleagues I might find out that quite a few of them have had their policies cancelled when they said they were becoming drivers, because insurance companies just hate delivery drivers, and don't understand that Domino's insurance covers us whilst at work and we only really want SDP and commuting. So instead they might just say they work as instores rather than drivers, and they might be paying a hell of a lot less than what I am now.

My dad thinks it's a better idea for me to just get business cover from Churchill (he only pays £1 extra for his) and not try and take shortcuts, because if I'm in an accident and someone gets seriously injured or worse, I need to be covered. But my work's third party insurance covers that - unless the accident's my fault and I'm the one injured, in which case I'm buggered - but personally I'm ok with taking that risk. I like fixing crashed cars, and if I'm seriously injured as a result of my own actions, I'll just have gotten what I deserve... and if I die, I won't be able to do much about it anyway.

I don't see why I need to have 2 policies in effect at the same time, and be paying 4 figures annual for one of them.

Any thoughts on this?

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even if the accident aint your fault it still goes up.and courier/ delivery insurance is preety expensive esp if your new. A few years ago i wanted to be a courier but when i got quotes for a combo van and plus using it as courier work my quote came back something like 3grand. thought fuk it because the wages only 200 a week.

Edited by madnemo
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Yeah, job seems to make just as much a difference. Just tried 3 different options for quotes:

6n + job as driver + both accidents: £3030 (I'm paying £1800 now)

6n + job as driver + without accidents: £1547

6n + job NOT driver + both accidents: £1696

And why the hell I am getting cheaper quotes for a 1.0 Polo than I am for a 2.0 MG, I have no idea :unknw:

Edited by Vio
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It's the professional driver thing. The more miles you do, particularly against the clock, the most accustomed and desensitised you become to falling into bad habits and taking risks.

You want to see a high premium, tell them you're a trade plate driver.

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It's the professional driver thing. The more miles you do, particularly against the clock, the most accustomed and desensitised you become to falling into bad habits and taking risks.

Given the state of most of the taxi drivers around here, that's hard to argue with :tongue: and I have had 2 crashes in 1 month... still, doubling my premiums as a result whilst not being covered on the clock anyway with SDP seems a bit unfair.

So the question is, do I become an instore rather than a driver? I do work the oven, take customer orders etc. when needed so it is technically speaking part of my job... in the event of a claim outside work it won't matter what my job is, and during work my third party insurance still applies. The only downside I can see is I personally won't be covered in an accident at work, but I'm ok with taking that risk to save what'll become 4 figures annually.

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I was going to say that, if you think you can sort yourself in the event of an accident at work, by all means let your employer cover the third party. The legalities of it are that you are insured, just under a different company with a different policy holder and it's Third Party only, I would ask for the CoI from your employer to carry with you if you were to ever get stopped, but as you would be insured off the clock anyway, you wouldn't flash up on an ANPR or anything unless you had an obvious defect and the cops saw the goods in the car and started asking questions. Your Personal policy can then cover you for SDP which you would only use outside of work, so don't give the office the wrong bit of paper if you get pulled haha.

Insurance is just that, don't get to glazed by all the terminology and the scare mongering. As long as your policy's clearly state that you are insured under a certain set of conditions and you are under those conditions then you are covered.

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what if youd done a bit of gardening for a pal and they paid you , could you put down gardener /window cleaner

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In the event of a claim, do they ask you to prove your employment? More specifically, do they ask you to prove that you're not a delivery driver? That's impossible. If you are not on their policy when you are delivering, then you are not a delivery driver as far as they are concerned. Honesty towards these crooks is what they can't prove, the rest is just words. I've been driving for 33 years and never had a claim so I've given them many, many thousands of pounds for a piece of paper that makes the pigs leave me alone and nothing else. They charge me £180 tpft on my 'standard' Polo and although I live in the ghetto, it's a very low rated area (not much reported crime, immigrants tend not to call the cops!). Add the fact that we are legally obliged to buy insurance from a commmercial, profit driven, industry at prices they just arbitarily make up. My son, 23 year old, was asked for £800 for a 55hp Polo (tpft) and £120 (comp) for a 100hp vfr750. There will be some corrupt logic to explain this but the fact remains that he can go 160mph, 0-60 in 3secs, anytime he likes, but is too high risk to pootle about in a shopping trolley. This is just stupid.

None of the above should be construed as advice, I'm just saying some stuff.

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I fully agree :tongue: what we need is a national insurance scheme like NZ has, where the government can just fund all claims via taxpayer money. People can also get better cars without having to worry about a fortune with insurance bills, and I'm also more likely to be a bit more careful with my R34 Skyline than my 1L 6n, so I'd think there'd be less claims to worry about anyway.

Another of our drivers couldn't come into work today because he didn't tell his insurance company that he's a delivery driver, and they've found out and voided his policy. This worries me, would like to hear how that came about :|

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  • 2 weeks later...

In the event of a claim, do they ask you to prove your employment? More specifically, do they ask you to prove that you're not a delivery driver? That's impossible. If you are not on their policy when you are delivering, then you are not a delivery driver as far as they are concerned. Honesty towards these crooks is what they can't prove, the rest is just words. I've been driving for 33 years and never had a claim so I've given them many, many thousands of pounds for a piece of paper that makes the pigs leave me alone and nothing else. They charge me £180 tpft on my 'standard' Polo and although I live in the ghetto, it's a very low rated area (not much reported crime, immigrants tend not to call the cops!). Add the fact that we are legally obliged to buy insurance from a commmercial, profit driven, industry at prices they just arbitarily make up. My son, 23 year old, was asked for £800 for a 55hp Polo (tpft) and £120 (comp) for a 100hp vfr750. There will be some corrupt logic to explain this but the fact remains that he can go 160mph, 0-60 in 3secs, anytime he likes, but is too high risk to pootle about in a shopping trolley. This is just stupid.

None of the above should be construed as advice, I'm just saying some stuff.

It's all about the percentage risks. My insurance is half on a 5dr Sport compared what to what it would be on an FR, even though they've got the same power and identical spec apart from the front bumper, wheel design (same size) and back doors.

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That's the explanation they always use and frankly, I find it unconvincing. A kid(ish) in a Polo is more likely to cause more damage than a kid(ish) on a superbike? If their statistics claim that it is about 8 times more probable and equally damaging or 8 times more expensive and equally likely, or somewhere in between those extremes, then I question the value of that method of risk assesment.

Actually, I don't, I call it utter bullshit.

If you want to hear real bare faced, laughable bullshit, then claim off someone else's insurance after they have admitted fault. The stuff they say could make one of those comedy skits, funnier and more ridiculous than that old Jasper Carrot speil.

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In all honesty insurance companies are clearly just out to make themselves (and I suspect their employees) a quick buck.

Whenever you phone up an insurance company about a quote, whoever is on the other end of the phone can usually make any quote cheaper at the drop of a hat. How many times have you heard "hold on the computer is being slow" when they are inputting data but if you ask them if you can get money off they can tell you in a second how much they can take off. So it wouldn't surprise me if the prices always include commission too.

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And we're legally obliged to keep 'em in profit. They just make their prices up and come out with some vague mumblings about risk factors that a right minded infant would mock. Sometimes it can work in your favour, tho', My w123 merc cost me £70 a year, comp, windscreen, everything except breakdown and 'legal protection'. Now that is one of their biggest scams, bullshitting that it's not optional, not mentioning it or just charging you for it anyway. That must be where the fattest comission must be because that's what they lie, fudge and wriggle about the most.

I live in the west end of Leicester and they claim that it's one of the most crime free areas in the whole country. I must be one in a million, then. My TV got burgled in broad daylight, chump came back to have another go a week later and I had the joyful experience of laying my hands on him. He was only hospitalised very briefly but the filth told me that I should have used a bit more 'reasonable force' during the 'arrest'. They said that I could have legally killed the fool as long as I did it quickly. Does this sound like what you'd expect from a 'crime free' area? The police advised me that I could legally kill someone...and my car insurance is a bloody rip off.

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I believe that they are properly taking the piss, not by blatant larceny but by pointing and laughing at us while they do it.

Edited by rico
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I believe that they are properly taking the piss, not by blatant larceny but by pointing and laughing at us while they do it.

What gets me is the fact you enter into a yearly contract with them. So once you buy insurance they have you pants down bent over a barrel just ready to shove it in dry whenever you want to make a change. My girlfriend always pays her car insurance up front in one go. But one year she got had big time. She cancelled a policy 8 months in due to that company not being able to insure her on her new car. Due to how they worked their cancellation charges and refund entitlements she was told she would get nothing back. So she had to pay for a new policy 4 months early and she missed out on a years NCB.

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I got rear-ended in my breadvan around this time last year. Was stopped at lights, and the woman behind me got flustered as an ambulance approached from behind. Set off right in to the back of me :-( She basically smashed the boot lock to bits, and pushed the bumper in to the body on the near side.

Got in touch with the insurance (as you do), and started the ball rolling. With DirectLine and at the time they were doing that whole spiel with Harvey Kietel where you get £10 per day after week until it's fixed.

3 weeks go by, no assessor, no contact, no nothing. Got sick of waiting, and was worried about them writing her off too, so went and bought a second hand boot lock and fitted it myself (different keys now :x ). Still waiting on the £10 per day to be sent to us, but they did reimburse us for the lock.

I guess my point is, insurance is an absolute racket. We are forced to pay (through the nose) for their services, when 95% of the time we don't even need them. Then when we do need them, we get every excuse under the sun as to why they can't or won't fix it. And then if you don't have insurance, your car can be towed by the police. Absolute joke.

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any of us driving an old polo is just paying for a bit of paper to keep the coppers off your back , the slightest mark on a nice clean polo will write it off and maybe pay out a couple of hundred if youre lucky

then have the hassle of having to tell the insurance about any claims for the next 5 years and have your pants pulled down even further

i also like how they have a database to use against you with regard to any bad history etc , but cant manage the ncb bit and insist on mailing bits of paper back n forth that get lost

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any of us driving an old polo is just paying for a bit of paper to keep the coppers off your back , the slightest mark on a nice clean polo will write it off and maybe pay out a couple of hundred if youre lucky

then have the hassle of having to tell the insurance about any claims for the next 5 years and have your pants pulled down even further

i also like how they have a database to use against you with regard to any bad history etc , but cant manage the ncb bit and insist on mailing bits of paper back n forth that get lost

Exactly. Bunch of extortionists. Why should it be around the same price to insure a 26 year old Polo, and a 4 year old Aygo? :x

Absolute joke...

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As I say, I've got a 33 year clean driving record, 'good' area, no points and 16 years no claims. First off, they only count up to nine with ncb so I'm never going to earn a larger discount. I can lose the lot quite easily, tho'. I drive a slow, light, worthless car...carefully (hah!). I'm one of those guys who 'drive everything', from ss pushbikes to 60 tonne dumpers, none of them for a living (anymore). Experience breeds complacency? Not on a motorcycle it don't! What risk am I? Why isn't my insurance practically free? Because it is not based on risk but on what they can get away with. Legally enforced theft, just like taxes, council tax, car 'tax', mobile phone contracts, tv licence, gas bills and the rest. We can moan but the worst of it is that they use the money to bomb the shit out of people much the same as us with the intention of undermining Europe with a massive influx of bewildered and traumatised refugees. It's so bleedin' obvious who was behind that Paris shit, the same mad dogs who did 9/11, 7/7, Fukushima, aids, ebola and the rest. Blame the ones who gain.

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i also like how they have a database to use against you with regard to any bad history etc , but cant manage the ncb bit and insist on mailing bits of paper back n forth that get lost

This is something that gets to me and just makes me thing they will look for any excuse to jack up the price. Of course they are going to have all your claims/convictions on file, if you lie then they will jack up the price. Of course they will leave it up to you to prove your no claims, if you can't/won't then they will jack up the price. They even make it hard for you, even in this day and age some companies say they don't have the facility for you to email proof of no claims. Forcing you to post them.

Then I only discovered last year that some companies are classing windscreen claims as actual claims that you have to declare!

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I find it a bit rich that lying to them can be frowned upon. They lie as a default position. Look at the disavantage that puts on the 'honest' punter. It turns him into a milkcow and a sap. I'm not advocating any course of action but it would be highly foolish to not say what is beneficial to oneself, as it is an adversarial interaction. Personally, I say whatever is convenient to reduce my premium. At the moment, I am a married, homeowning, non smoking psychiatric nurse doing 1500 miles a year in a totally standard, brick garaged, Polo as a second vehicle and I walk to work. And maybe, possibly, I am. But it reduced my premium by 50%, so all those things must be true.

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did you try parked on the street for a quote ? its cheaper for me than locked in garage

and yeah on the lies...its alright for them to write " dear mr mug , weve searched and done our very best , the best price is £££££ " then you call up and say f.o its cheaper elsewhere and suddenly they can click and whey hey its a price match

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Cheaper in an imaginary garage. I didn't spend a long time on it, hacked out the most obvious shit, replaced it with pink, straight shit, turned down all their add ons, argued over the premium and gave them the money. A copper once told me to always insure another vehicle on the policy even if it don't exist, that way they can't cancel the policy if you claim. Marginal advice, more appropriate for motorcycles, but it shows how to approach this whole deal. We can debate what 'truth' means all day long because no one knows what it is. For me, it's that what makes my life easy rather than hard. I'm not dealing with a person but a bureaucracy, therefore 'truth' means something different. What I'm saying here is honest but I wouldn't talk to the state like this. Well, maybe I do, just to make em uncomfortable, but that's my way of getting my own back. Force them to drop the corporate facade or look like an idiot. Given a clear choice most choose the former but I enjoy it more when they choose the latter. It's all a load of bollocks, anyway.

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