To think that you should always use your headlights when driving in the dark?

But we're talking about the people who blithely trust the features without making sure that they're actually switched on.

Unless and until cars all have automatic lights which cannot be turned off or deactivated by the driver when the engine is on - and which emit a horrible loud beep and flash up a massive unignorable warning on the dash if they aren't working - it seems like we're going to get a sizeable minority of drivers who don't diligently check that their automatic lights are actually functional before relying on them.

Perfectly fine as long as people actually make sure to check that the automatic features are switched on in the first place!

Whatever it is making people 'forget' that leads to them driving unlit in the dark is what needs to be urgently addressed. Drivers who use whichever options they find better properly, diligently and safely... all grand.

But the clear problem is - as attested to on this thread - that some people believe that the existence of automatic lights means that they never ever have to even think to check that the automatic lights are still on/haven't been previously switched off.

My point is that, as a responsible driver would know anyway as a basic essential that they need to remember to ensure that their automatic lights are on, what is the actual point of them in the first place over clicking a knob two or three times to turn them on and know that you've turned them on? They don't bring any real benefits, but their presence does seem to make some drivers complacent and thus never bother to check that they aren't driving in the dark in a completely unlit car.

Are you really saying that it's a weird to start a thread to suggest that people in fast moving vehicles in the dark should ensure that they have lights on?!

Three days in a row now, for the morning school run, I've seen the same car without any lights on. Twice I've had to brake sharply because they've appeared out of nowhere in the dark, and they tend to drive a little 'over-assertively' shall we say.

And before anybody protests at how beautifully sunny it is in their part of the UK at 8:30am right now, it is seriously dark here - that's why every one of the other many vehicles on the road except for this one and one other car naturally had their headlights on.

They had that public information advert on TV a few years ago where they felt the need to tell drivers who broke down on the motorway that they should try to get over left to the hard shoulder if at all possible, rather than just staying stationary in their current lane; so maybe we also need a TV ad campaign to inform adults who drive that it's much safer and easier to see and be seen in the dark if you use lights, and to remember to check that you have them on in the dark.

Ive flashed countless people this afternoon, if you are driving in well lit areas with lots of other cars around you and you started driving in daylight I can see how people without auto lights can forget.

But isn't reacting to the changing conditions a very major part of basic driving? Don't people actually notice that it's getting gradually harder and harder to see in front of them outside?!

My car is 2011, but it does have a little 'auto' symbol on the light knob. I've had the car for three years, but I've never actually used that setting. It's extremely clear from the driver's seat what setting it's on - unless you only ever stare straight forward and never turn your head or your gaze when driving.

Not only would I not trust it - and from this thread, it sounds like they're very liable to cause a lot of confusion and resulting unlit cars in the dark - but I've simply never had any reason at all to use it. If it's light with good visibility, I don't need lights on; and when it gets dark and/or the visibility is poor, it takes me less than a second to click it on.

What improvement do they actually bring to the driving experience? Are people really so lazy that they had to invent a whole new system just to save them from turning a knob two or three clicks every now and again? Is it for drivers whose eyesight and/or perception of the conditions isn't good enough to be able to tell whether it's light or dark? If so, it's deeply worrying that those people are allowed to drive in the first place.

I just got back from shopping and there was another one today - 5:45pm and very much night time in my town, however blindingly light it may currently be elsewhere in the UK. I was about to pull on to what looked like a clear roundabout, but had to stop suddenly when I saw this completely unlit car coming around.

I don't know whose fault that would officially have been if I hadn't seen them and pulled on to the roundabout, and we'd crashed - would it be mine for pulling out when it wasn't clear of theirs for driving at night without any lights? Either way, I know a very easy way that it would have been an awful lot safer for both of us - even though there were a few streetlights very high up.

It seems like there are quite a few forgetful people in my town, bless 'em.

I'm not saying at all that people are doing it deliberately (except possibly a tiny minority playing chicken or seeking an insurance scam 'crash for cash').

What I'm saying is that drivers should deliberately and actively know when it's appropriate to have their lights on - as instinctively as you carefully check your mirrors before pulling out, even though you haven't happened to notice anybody else around with a general glance.

Having said that, I remember a thread on here from some time ago where the OP had been in a parked car in the seat facing into the middle of the road, and she opened her door without looking at the road, right into a cyclist riding past along the road - necessitating an insurance claim iirc. I was astounded at the number of people on the thread who insisted that the cyclist was wholly to blame for using the road normally without looking into every parked car in case they might have an occupant who could potentially fling their door wide open into the traffic, totally oblivious.

But the reason why I started the thread is that it's not rare - at least in my own town/area. I recall seeing the very occasional driver without lights in the past - including one a few years back that I followed for a couple of miles through a big city centre on a Saturday night with me and countless other drivers repeatedly flashing, but apparently oblivious to what any of the other vehicles on the road were doing and resolutely leaving their lights off - but it's the number of people I've noticed doing it recently since it started getting dark early.

You would naturally hope that it's a genuine error and that flashing them would make them realise and quickly turn them on; but you have no idea of the driver's temperament and how nastily they might react if they feel affronted by you 'telling them off'. Some of them may even be doing it deliberately to cause you to crash into them, to scam your insurance, denying everything about having no lights on - we just can't know.

Even if they aren't the type who are prone to road rage, if they're of the same mind as some people on this thread, they won't thank you for warning them that they can't easily be seen, because they presume to know better and somehow think that it's 'fussing unnecessarily' to ever think to use your lights unless on a windy country lane at midnight.

There were two separate AIBUs in my OP - the main one in the title and a second one at the end that I maybe should have phrased differently to avoid any potential confusion.

As I've said repeatedly throughout this thread, I get that we all make mistakes - and one would hope that somebody making a momentary error could be warned (by other drivers or the police) and remember to be more careful next time. I certainly wouldn't be wanting to pounce and give people points on their licence the moment they started their engines in the dark before turning on their lights a second or two later.

If drivers are happy to drive around in the dark on the basis that there are streetlights, that's up to them. I'm not in the police or an employee of their car insurance company, so I'm in no position to be able to state with any authority whether they would agree with them if they were involved in an accident after dark and they told them that they hadn't felt it necessary to turn their own car lights on.