Driving without business use insurance

[newcat12345]

Husband who rarely uses my car was stopped driving home from a meeting today. I only have social, domestic and commuting insurance as don't need it for work purposes and this was a total oversight.

Even though I rectified the situation straight away with the insurer, DH has been slapped with 6 points and a £300 fine . To my mind a ticking off would've sufficed but that's neither here nor there.

My real concern is that I now have to go back to the insurer to tell them about the points. Is there a risk they will revoke the policy or are they likely to view it as an oversight? Petrified

Road Traffic Act? Can't be much less cover than Third Party Only?

And if you give someone a lift and drop them off at their place of work it tends to only be covered as commuting if you don’t deviate from your own normal route to your work.

Road Traffic Act? Can't be much less cover than Third Party Only?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RTA_Insurer

I started driving in 83, so it looks like it changed in 1988.

I know a bit more about the S.75 as my previous employer found themselves having to shell out a pretty penny under that ...

And if you give someone a lift and drop them off at their place of work it tends to only be covered as commuting if you don’t deviate from your own normal route to your work.

So what happens if you pop to the shops on the way home from work as I often do, that's a deviation but it is not business use.

Also what about going to for example a work Christmas meal (paid for by work) at lunchtime at the pub, that I guess is business use.

I park my car at my gym and walk into work. Sometimes I go to the gym then work and sometimes I go after work. Sometimes I don't go to the gym at all and sometimes I go to the gym on my day off. How can they actually know if I'm commuting or not?

Some parents I know drop their DC off at work on the way to work, I’m sure they haven’t all got business insurance, or most likely don’t know they shouldn’t do this.

@WhentheDealGoesDown if they’re on the way to work they don’t need business cover, they don’t even need commuting cover till there actually on route.

If you ever travel to a train station to travel to work or travel to a fixed location for work then you need commuting use
If you ever travel to any other location for work, your regular location or have to drive to a bank, post office, wholesalers, training course, meeting etc you need Class 1 business use. This will also cover your spouse for any business travel

Well joy of joys. DS and DH phoned the insurance company to say that he works part time in one of his jobs as a sports coach going to a different location once a day. They won't cover it so we've now got to find new insurance. Grrrrrrrrrr.

I don't agree that it's travelling to more than one site per day that counts as business use.

It's whether you go somewhere that is not your normal place of work, which I think everyone has to legally define, whether it is a particular site or a home address if someone is home based either self employed or for an employer.

If you travel to your normal place of work that is standard commuting, if you travel somewhere else, that is business travel. If you are self employed or home based, every journey is business travel. If you carry out business travel, then you need business insurance.

Flying Can he do the sports coaching without driving, perhaps using a bike? Changing insurance is usually expensive.

Oh no, Flyingarcher, that sounds like it could be expensive, I'm guessing he is quite a young driver so doesn't have a huge choice of reasonable price insurance companies anyway.

Yes, he is young. Just finished sixth form. Hopefully uni in Sept that he could drive to but probs won't. He earns very good money as an hourly rate coaching in his sport - just kids and adults for recreation so not carting around anyone and no equipment. He also works at a Supermarket (half the hourly rate of his coaching). He has picked up quite a bit of coaching at weekends, cover work and over the week plus trying to get more supermarket hours. Have found a quote as sports coaching as his main role (he only does 8 hours to 12 hours a week but he isn't technically a 'student' at the mo, with business use for £450 more than what I paid to sodding Less Than. He's offered to pay but he is supposed to be saving for uni. It's just such a pain in the bum. We had to change his insurance once he passed his test as that company was going to put it up to £4000!

Really wished I hadn't poked this hornets nest and left well alone. There must be loads of students driving around doing a range of temp jobs.

He has to drive ( oh the freedom of not having to give him lifts,) as public transport not great apart from one location.

To the people who've asked about doing stuff, gym, shops, school enroute to or from work it's SDP.

Business is required if you leave one place and go to another.
Flying Archer is he going to more than one venue in the same shift? Could his employer transport him either by a lift or taxi claimed on expenses?

The other thing is if its during a shift people can claim tax relief at what ever the current rate per mile is the last time I looked it was about 40p per mile.

Flyingarcher From a PP Aviva allow you to vary your place of work each day, as long as you travel to only one workplace each day. Might be worth a look.

I think he is likely only to work in one venue at one time and it is separate working hours. He isn't employed by them but is contracted to them and fills out a timesheet. Then if he covers another coach he invoices that individual directly. It's a complicated way of the company not having to pay Nat ins, pension, etc. Effectively he is self employed which is why I think just because of that time he ought to be business use?

Flying the selfemployed bit might put a different spin on it.

I think I'd call around a few insurers or get a decent broker to do it for you and see what they say.

If they'd insure got to and from any venue as sdp at a decent price but exclude travel between them.
I think I would be tempted to taxi, or bus between venues for the odd occasion he does it.

Flying, Does he work for what is called an Umbrella company through an agency if he fills in a timesheet, it’s sort of like self employed but the Umbrella company sorts out your wages and you work for them. I worked for one once but only one place of work and I used to claim mileage and expenses. A lot of agency workers work through them.

@WhentheDealGoesDown no he doesn't, I don't think. They certainly don't cough out for expenses. I really wish we hadn't phoned the other company to enquire and had just told him not to wear his top with 'c9mpany name and Coach' emblazoned on it. This thread has cost me £500! But I suppose it might have been more if he had an accident and he was returning from work. I still don't know if this is commuting or business ( which I thought was using your vehicle for business purposes like delivery, electrician, going from place to place). They don't define it at all.

Flyingarcher I’m surprised the club he coaches for still manages to operate like that, as HMRC has been trying to phase it out for sports coaches - several years ago I took over admin for a club with 60 “self-employed” coaches / teachers / assistants and had to convert them all to employees as otherwise I couldn’t get the club insurances in place. I think it’s the fact they have to arrange their own cover that means the club can define them as self-employed.

Thanks to all and Tesco car insurance he is now insured for business usage plus the usual. When did this adulting get so hard?

Flying I'm glad you have it sorted the easy way.