Car insurance

[flapperdapper]

My DD, 18, has just passed her driving test and is getting ready to buy her first (used) car. We are looking into insurance and it appears that if you have a black telematics box fitted, insurance is cheaper.

But here’s the rub: My DD works full time in a restaurant. It’s not that far away, but she would be using the car to drive home late at night after work, sometimes at even two or three in the morning. Apparently that is not allowed if you have a black box.

Without the black box, insurance is over £6000 a year for a 10 year old Ibiza! Does anyone have any experience or suggestions?

My dd has a black box but has no restrictions on the times she can be driving.

AnxiousShep We’ve seen several that don’t have a curfew (eg Admiral) but the quote is so expensive — over £6000 — compared to ones without a curfew. What company do you use?

Ticker

DD went with direct line. She didn't have a black box and the difference was £300 - worth a phone call

Dc1 had a black box with no restrictions from Hastings direct (has worked for NHS since 18 doing shifts so it was a necessity). Renewed car insurance recently and has stayed with them as the price came down significantly.

Marmalade don’t care what time you’re out driving. It’s just a little box you stick on your windscreen that connects to your phone. Dd1’s first year was about £1050. She needed one where they didn’t mind how many miles she did as she had a 40 mile round trip to college.

just done her second year and managed to get it for £730 without a box, so it comes down quite a bit after the firsts year.

We have a policy with Insure the Box, which gives extra miles for good driving assessed across several factors. One of those is driving between 11 & 4am. So you can drive then, but it will mean you don’t get all your bonus miles that month.

Also I’m not sure if seat Ibiza’s are the cheapest cars for young drivers. When I was looking the cheapest were Citroen c1s, then Peugeot 107s, then Aygos, Hyundai i10s and Suzuki altos. They might not be much more, but some cars seemed to be weirdly expensive to insure for what seemed like no real reason.

might be worth trying different cars if you haven’t brought one yet.

There are multiple companies who do black boxes without restrictions, DS (18) has no restrictions and was the same for dd four years ago when she had one. What’s the engine size of your dd’s Seat Ibiza?

Another vote for Marmalade. DS used them and there were no time restrictions. If you leave it a couple of weeks after they've passed the price usually drops by several hundred pounds too.

Agree that she also needs a cheaper car to insure than an Ibiza.

It’s a 1.2.

Mine never had restrictions (3 DCs). I think we used Tesco, Admiral & More than. Probably others over the years too as we tend to change each year.

I totally agree but DD only wants an Ibiza or Polo even though she said she’d look at a C1 or Aygo to make us happy 🙄She’s paying for it.

The other thing is that the first year's insurance is horrendous but it falls pretty quickly after that. I think DS's was £1800 the first year. Four years later is is about £300.

I thought 90% of insurers had stopped trying to set curfews, after a fatal crash where a young driver was speeding in an attempt to get home before curfew.

Insurance has shot up for everyone recently. Location is a massive factor you can do little about. Car model doesn't make that much difference provided it's reasonable, but people say that larger estates and saloons can end up cheaper than city cars - the city cars are so popular with young inexperienced drivers that it's made them statistically higher risk.

Beware of excessive "quote shopping". Insurers' systems will notice and some will treat repeated quotes from the same person with different details as a sign of potential fraud, and that insurer will stop providing quotes.

The reality may be that your DD cannot afford to drive to work that job, and she will have to either find other transport options or resign.

My DD passed last August at 17,she got a Mini Cooper 1.6 and paid just over 1.2k for insurance with Churchill, she had the app(instead of a physical black box) but was no restrictions on when could drive. She has just renewed it with them and the price has come down to just over £800 so pretty good.

That is unbelievable! A Mini Cooper at 17 at that price. Wow.

I thought it was good, she has friends with smaller engine cars that paid more for insurance than she did!