to put my mother as a named driver to lower my insurance?

Could you ask your mum to take you to a nearby pub occasionally, maybe at lunchtime when the roads are clear? A glass of tonic water each and straight home? Then she would be an occasional driver.

Well i work in motor insurance fraud and have done for 10 years, and I'm telling you that it's not fraud.

So it would be incredibly easy to defend in court. Because adding someone else to your insurance as a named driver when you're the main user, owner and policyholder Is. Not. Fraud.

No as I added my friend. Then tried another relative female. And more money

add a man and lower

No, it's not illegal :)

It's only illegal if you put someone down as the main driver when they won't be the main driver.

Nope.

Nope.

Is this true though? Is it really illegal to insure someone to drive it in the case of an emergency even if there is no intention to drive it regularly/otherwise? Genuine question, I'm not an insurance expert but it seems like a perfectly legitimate thing to me.

You are essentially committing fraud if you know your mother never intends to drive the car.

Of course you are. You asked how it could be defended. Because it’s completely legal and there is nothing fraudulent about it. Named drivers can be there for all kinds of reasons which have nothing to do with intent to drive the car.

I don't see anything fraudulent about it. Being insured to theoretically drive the car eg in an emergency in no way compels the OP's mother to drive it regardless. Obviously as long as all medical information disclosed.

The morals are irrelevant - you are claiming it's fraud. It is not. HTH.

@tumblingdowntherabbithole

No I am not "fundamentally misunderstanding" anything, thank you.

Just because something is legal in terms of the Ts and Cs does not mean that it is morally correct.

OP is putting her mother on her insurance for no other reason than to lower her premium. The mother has not driven the car recently, is not likely to drive the car and this is purely something she is doing to lower her premium.

We will have to disagree but to me that might be legal but it is fraudulent in intent. I am not going to go back and forth with you about it. It's my view. If the mother was (like others have said) an equal user of the car etc fine. This is not the situation described. It's in the OP. The intent is clear.

It's not sexist, because the same is true for men who add a 2nd driver, and it lowers the premium whether the 2nd driver is a man or a woman, and it doesn't matter how often they drive the car. Any car is cheaper to insure with pretty much any two named drivers than it would be with only one,

No, you are fundamentally misunderstanding.

You can name whoever you like on your car insurance. They don't have to live with you or have any intention of ever driving your car.

What you can't do is put someone down as the main driver when they won't be.

I found after my dh died my insurance went up so I added another male to my insurance and went down ffs

esp as all the time we were married he never drove my car as had his own van

totally sexist

they didn’t ask how often he would drive the car so he was just a named driver

My kids put me and DH on their insurance to lower it. We both have our own cars, so wouldn't take be driving their cars, but we can if needs be.

DH has me on his insurance, as it lowers it too.

Does your mother still actually have a valid driving licence? I believe in the UK, driving licences need to be renewed at 70 and every 3 years after that, so has your mother been renewing her licence and will she continue to do so?

@LittleYellowQueen

From the OP:

”I am naming her on my insurance as it lowers my premium”

Please, tell me, how would you defend this in court? The mother doesn’t even want to drive the car.

This is fraud. The intent is fraudulent.

I think it’s fine. Adding my DH used to knock off £100 off the annual price, even though he never drove my car.

It's not fronting.

Fronting is misrepresentation of who the main user of the vehicle is to achieve a cheaper premium.

Maybe its different insurance companies work differently.

For a long time it made no difference to mine if my Dad was on my insurance or not. It started to increase when he was in early 70s.

Having named drivers on your insurance is not “fraud”, otherwise it wouldn’t be an option.

Fraud requires some kind of misrepresentation, lying or deceit. That is not what OP is doing.

It doesn’t work like that. It’s about the risk being spread more than each individual’s risk.

No issues whatsoever as long as you’re not lying about anything.

My mum has always been on my insurance, from when I lived at home right til present day. She always reduces my premiums, and I’ve also had my dad on there if it reduced it further.

I am policyholder and main driver. They are named drivers.

Do they drive my car? Well, only my mum is currently on my cover, and generally no, she doesn’t. But, she actually needed to drive it just last week to rescue me when I developed an ocular migraine whilst out in the car!! So without that cover I’d have struggled.

I don't lie about anything on my cover, she’s not a daily user of my car, but occasionally does drive it and I benefit from a lower premium.

In fact, at one renewal the insurer even helped me do this! Tried it out with my mum and dad on/off the policy to see the premiums 🤣 we removed my dad as he put it up ever so slightly that year.

I am named driver on DH's car. I have never driven it but would in an emergency or if my car was unavailable. In OP's case she is saying her mum would never drive it, so the purpose of putting her name on the policy is simply to reduce the premium, no other reason.