Avoid scrapes in rush hour to keep van insurance down

Rush hour is just one of those aspects of driving that workers have to put up with in over-congested and over-populated cities and, according to a recent report, contributes to a disproportionately high amount of van insurance claims, given the speed, or lack of it, that is inherent with driving in such conditions.

Swinton Commercial have picked up on a report conducted by the Institute of Advanced Motorists that highlights the issue and the contributory factors that could lead van drivers, who are normally alert and responsive to the environment in which they are driving, struggling to find cheap van insurance renewal quotes because they have had an accident that was totally avoidable if they had been paying closer attention to their surrounding environment.

One of the key contributors to rush hour accidents is that van drivers are so familiar with their route that they start to take the drive and the aspects on their way to work for granted. It is almost as if complacency takes over when there is no room in driving for such luxury, no matter how well the route is driven; paying attention and retaining focus at all times is a must if commercial drivers wish to avail themselves of continual cheap van insurance.

Commuters are advised to keep their vehicle well maintained, too, as road rage is another factor prevalent with rush hour incident that can lead to road traffic accidents and loss of no claims bonuses. When getting to work on time is imperative, yet traffic dictates otherwise, even the smallest of vehicle malfunctions can have an adverse effect on the van driver’s mood and temperament.

What IAM recommend is ensuring that vehicles are constantly well maintained and niggles aren’t just ironed out because it’s time for the van’s MOT. Little things like keeping window washer bottles topped up can be the difference between a driver keeping their cool in a situation that could deteriorate in a rush hour environment but would otherwise be passed off without incident.

Aside from IAM’s advice, there are courses available for hazard perception that, as well as helping keep van drivers safe and alert to roadside distractions also help to keep van insurance premiums low. Getting to work can be a chore in itself, but getting there without incident is imperative to your own safety and that of other road users, too.

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Cheap van insurance broker warns on parking up

Parking up while making deliveries could spell disaster for drivers, according to one leading cheap van insurance broker.

Commercial van insurance providers, Swinton Vans, say that drivers can find themselves swiftly transforming into crime victims in the wake of leaving their vans unattended for any length of time.  People who leave their vans unlocked and their engines running while they step away from their vehicles can quite often become preyed upon by sharp-eyed criminals looking for an easy score, Swinton said, adding that what many of these drivers fail to realise is that they risk the invalidation of their budget van insurance by leaving their vehicles unattended.

The number of vans that are nicked on an annual basis due to drivers leaving their vehicles running was estimated at 30,000 on average, according to Swinton Vans.  However, burglaries are as common as outright theft, with many making the mistake of leaving valuables on show and in easy reach of thieves.

Tablets, satnavs, and phones are all stolen quite often if placed down and left unattended in a place where passersby can abscond with them while a van driver goes about making deliveries.  Making matters worse is that these objects are quite often crucial for conducting business, leading to it becoming essential for either hiding them or taking them with you when you exit the vehicle, the insurance broker told van owners.

However, delivery drivers are not altogether blameless victims.  Many have fallen afoul of the law themselves, such as when they park their vans in restricted zones such as double yellow lines, and some may not have the expectation of being caught red-handed, many a delivery driver has found themselves in hot water on more than one occasion.

Police warning ahead of Bank Holiday weekend daytrips

Ah, the Bank Holiday weekend. More to the point, the Sunday of the same – historically the last leg of the tour we used to do every Bank Holiday weekend – Manchester to Blackpool. The Friday we’d hit Stafford; Saturday, Stoke; Sunday, The Hacienda; before pulling into Blackpool just as the sun was coming up on the Monday morning, sometimes catching a couple of hours kip in the back of my brother’s van before seeing out the remainder of the mini-break along the Golden Mile, or others just waiting on the beach for the resort to wake up as ozone crashed out of the murky breakers dashing in off the Irish Sea.

We never even contemplated that he hadn’t got the right van insurance for the ‘M6 Totty Trail’ we used to follow thrice annually (we’d be abroad for Whit). Four tops, two trousers, underwear optional hung up or stashed in the racking in the back of the van that, if we were unlucky, would double up as our sleeping quarters – needless to say, there was a valet performed before we hit the road and after we got back home in the early hours of Tuesday morning before we headed straight off to work after the tools were loaded back inside. Had we ever been pulled over mid-Tour, there was no doubt ‘our kid’ would have accrued a few more license points in his race to hit double figures.

In the exuberance of youth, such oversights were often the cause of a less-cheap van insurance renewal quote; thankfully, the premiums in ’88-90 where nothing like the massive hikes we see now for van insurance for young drivers or for those with excessive points on their license – we’d never have afforded the weekend breaks if he’d have had to pay for all of his pretty points.

Commercial insurance company warn of danger of van insurance claims this weekend

There is a similar warning coming out of Swinton Commercial, in light of the first Bank Holiday of 2012, relaying information from Newton Abbey police who are issuing warnings of expected heavy traffic in their jurisdiction and cautioning patience in order to reduce road rage, little prangs and any subsequent van insurance claims that may result.

Superintendent Muir Clark, Road and Armed Support Unit chief, instructed his constabulary to be on the lookout for a whole host of driving offences that could lead to heated situations should jams be prevalent on UK roads this Bank Holiday. (What do you mean:’ should’? I’d say that’s guaranteed) Amongst the list, he included driving under the influence of drink or drugs, driving erratically to endanger ‘innocent road user[s]’ and failing to wear a seatbelt.

Any of the above will lead to license points, reducing chances of a cheap van insurance quote when it’s time to renew. Also, it is worth checking out, if you have a company van and are thinking of using it to traverse the M6 Totty Trail between Wolverhampton and Blackpool that we used to follow or your own route in search of youthful high jinx, whether your van insurance includes any aspect of domestic or leisure usage.

Oh – and get an air freshener, just in case you do have to spend the early hours kipping in such an enclosed space with your brother after a night out on the lash. Blackpool never smelt so fresh…

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Van sales annual rise papers over cracks in true trend

It was going to take some doing, staying at the 2011 new van sales registration rates; the latest figures issued by the SMMT reflect exactly how difficult a proposition 2012 is going to prove. Whilst trucks growth grew in line with year on year figures van and light commercial vehicle sales were down a considerable 11.1%.

Last year saw a surge in the market after many firms had held out buying in 2010 purely because of the state of the economy. Their hands were more or less forced into the market place in 2011 as used vans coming onto the market became older, organisations squeezing every last mile out of their vans.

It can make commercial sense, keeping that initial outlay liquid for another year as uncertainty still shadows our economy, which the first quarter’s vans sales predict organisations may well do. Plus the fact an older model van generally attracts a cheaper van insurance quote over a brand new model, purely down to the value of the investment that the insurance broker is duty-bound to protect when you take out the policy with them.

And it certainly looks as if we’re going to have another lean year. One aspect that may also have had bearing on the first three months’ figures, especially for the sole trader as many light commercial vehicle owners are, is the rush that the housing sector had for first time buyers to save on Stamp Duty pre-March 24th.

No matter how much you save on fuel, tax and are successful in obtaining cheap van insurance, there aren’t many budgets that will stretch to a new home and a new van in the same quarter. As the housing sector has been quiet for far too long and consumers decided that by completing their move early this year they would avoid the 1% Stamp Duty being brought back into force, they may well have chosen (or had the decision made for them by their partner) that a house move was in order this year and the new van would have to wait.

However, Paul Everitt of the SMMT has another angle. Every organisation has a transportation budget and, in the event that extra income for transport will come through price increases – indeed, in the automotive sector itself, locking in prices for two or three ears is not uncommon – something has to give with the backdrop of ever-rising fuel prices. As the UK economy waits to see where the prices of fuel is going to stop and decisions on fuel levies are yet to be decided long term, perhaps fleet managers or finance departments are warning against the extravagance of new vans; rather, keep a hold of any extra cash in the transport budget for fuel increases as and when they hit the pumps and make considered decisions about the fleet when there is more clarity.

However, the rolling year is still slightly up, at 3.9%, due to a strong finish last year, but those record sales do dilute the picture somewhat and hide the underlying trend that the bottom is rapidly falling out of the new van market, whichever way you look at it. Do we have confidence back in the economy? We’ll let you be the judge of that.

Highways agency set stall out for 2012

Have you ever wondered where your road tax goes or when you take out your van insurance what the premium contributes to? Well, with van insurance, we know that a lot of the cost recently has gone to paying out the spurious whiplash injuries that have pushed up the price of vehicle cover across the board.

But road tax, at least a percentage, goes towards the highways agency and looking after over 4,000 miles of UK motorways. If we want to keep our van insurance premium at any sort of affordable rate, the roads upon which we travel need to be at optimum driveability to avoid incidents.

And that’s exactly what they intend to do with the rest of this year and have laid out their budget and targets online so that we know roughly where our contributions are going to.

In general, there is an underlying theme for the Highways Agency to improve roads in an efficient manner, wherever the work is needed, in and around areas of local industry. The priority is to get the economy back on its feet, so where there is a need for road works to ensure business is kept ticking over, then they are likely to address issues there first than before those in rural communities.

The inaugural Asset Support Contract will go live mid-2012, an initiative to deliver a better strategic road network whilst simultaneously seeking to offer more value for money than its predecessor. And, as we reported here on cheapvaninsurance.co.uk some time ago, the deployment of the CLEAR system following any motorway incident will be implemented, certainly for the stages of that initiative that are operable.

CLEAR is one of the better uses of technology of governmental departments in recent times. Due to motorway closure times, causes of accidents to determine where blame lies and some dubious motor insurance claims, the system seeks to understand what or who caused any accident and take preventative measures wherever possible to avoid a repeat performance in the future.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out as consumers will, for the first time, be able to give feedback about the handling of such instances and about the role of the Highways Agency in general. The accidents that do happen will also be given a severity rating, assuming using information gleaned from CLEAR and priorities will be determined from that evidence regards reduction of opportunity for similar accidents to happen again.

There are many more specifics on the highways agency site but, in order to retain a cheap van insurance following an incident that was not your fault, you now stand a better chance than ever of proving you were not to blame as the crash analysis using CLEAR will not only clear the affected area of the motorway more but also look to exonerate anyone not directly involved with the cause.

An interesting year ahead, then, especially with the reduced budget as prescribed in the 2010 budget.

Bridgestone using C V Show to highlight industry projections

One of the most overlooked aspects of safe driving is ensuring that your tyres do what they’re supposed to, whether it’s wet, dry or on several inches of packed snow. At the forefront of tyre technology for many years has been Bridgestone, whose innovative research has helped domestic, commercial and championship vehicles drive safely, in all manner of instances.

Last month, we highlighted their road-testing of its low rolling resistance tyres due for launch next year that will help cut down fuel consumption and deliver cheaper van insurance through improved efficiency and safer handling.

All of this will be evident at the C V Show towards the end of April as Bridgestone have a huge display planned for the event running between the 24th and 26th, inclusive at the NEC in Birmingham. But rather than just plug their own products, the tyre giants will use the opportunity to highlight myriad other developments in the commercial vehicle industry. Granted, that ‘other news’ will probably tie in with their tyres at some point further along the line but it is a window for fleet managers to look through to see what they can expect over the next year, or so.

Bridgestone will use their stand to run daily seminars at no cost whatsoever to visitors, intended to incorporate all of the values that they foresee helping fleet managers control costs over the next 12-18 months, according to John Follis, their Sales and Marketing chief.

With one eye looking over our shoulder just to make sure that pesky recession is not sneaking up on us, the other eye will be firmly on balancing the books for industry of all types, coming out of the back end of 2013 in no worse state than they are at the minute the major priority. Bridgestone want to express what options are available for fleet managers to help keep their running costs down to a minimum and where their company fits into that jigsaw. A laudable effort, indeed.

As well as cheap van insurance being a crucial part of keeping down fleet costs, Bridgestone have an agenda of seminars that are not only insightful, but practicable, too. These sessions will be part presentation, part debate and with a spice of advice thrown in, for good measure, covering such topics as wheel security, fuel efficiency, tyre maintenance and Truck Point, which covers fleet requirements; all points will be targeting the tyre manufacturer’s role within them, of course, and it will also be displaying its diverse range of retreads.

For more information or to book your tickets, go to the C V Show online.

Staff stiffed in Robin Hood city

Recently, we reported that Brighton and Hove council had introduced parking fees for prime spaces along its busy streets for commercial vehicle drivers, who were up in arms about the fee, arguing that fuel and van insurance was nowhere near as cheap as it had been and they could ill-afford the extra £300 per annum the council had introduced.

Although the fee Nottingham will implement is similar to the charge that Brighton Council introduced, the terms are a whole lot worse, harking back to days of The Sheriff of Nottingham that would have Olde Robin turning in his grave – if anyone really knew where that was.

Nottingham Council plan to impose a practise that was decried publicly by many organisations, including the AA, when the concept was dreamed up back in 2009. It directly affects all companies working in Nottingham City who have car parking spaces for ten or more vehicles. Each individual space attracts a set fee, in this case, Nottingham has decided the price on ‘space’ is £288 per annum. The companies whose premises are subject to the tax can, if they want, pass on that cost to employees.

Thinly disguised as a ruse to get employees to use public transport or car-share, those involved at the time suggested it was simply another method of taxing UK drivers, already struggling to keep up with rising fuel and spiralling car and van insurance renewal costs at the time. As the economic downturn set about the whole of the UK, the plan had, up to this point, been shelved.

The view of 84% of the AA Populus Panel was that this scheme was simply another way of extracting more tax from workers to fund a public transport system they may never use, on totally valid grounds. The bad news for the UK workforce is that more than a quarter, 27%, of the panellists at the time took the dreamers of the scheme’s words to heart and intended to pass on the cost, or part of it, which will rise either in line with inflation or at an optional rate of 3%, to its employees.

Three years on and there has been a similar greeting for the ‘workplace parking tax’ as it will be known. AA president, Edmund King, commented on what a disastrous time this was to implement such a system. In 2009, when renewing van insurance cheaply was difficult enough, motorists are faced with record prices at the pumps and will not take kindly if they have to stump up almost £300 for the privilege of parking where they have to work.

Needless to say, there will be very few merry men – and women – left in Nottingham when the fees start to impact.

Environment Agency slams van drivers at flood roadworks

Van drivers have been lambasted by the Environmental Agency for continually driving through sets of temporary traffic lights outside a school in Todmorden, West Yorkshire. In its attempt to construct the UK’s behind-schedule flood-defence barriers, the agency has reduced the Rochdale Road that passes outside the school to single lane traffic to allow contractors to complete the essential work, but commercial vehicle drivers are running a very real risk of jeopardising students safety and their own van insurance if they are caught, with points on their license a very real possibility.

Not content with ignoring the temporary lights system, it is reported that van drivers are also treating the school’s pedestrian crossing with the same disregard, a facility used by pupils and parents alike to gain access to the Todmoren school.

It seems that no amount of effort by police or the contractors themselves, who have organised temporary crossing assistance, can abate a flood of incident reports that file into the complaints department about irresponsible van drivers. It is not only pupils who are being put at risk but also the Volker Stevin contractors who are carrying out the Environment Agency work, who are unable to work without the threat that reckless van drivers pose to their on-the-job safety.

Following the issue of a statement by Will Benedikz, who is overseeing the Todmoren flood alleviation scheme implementation, the police are now in the process of installing cameras in the hope that this will deter motorists from ignoring the single lane warnings. The added threat of an on-the-spot fine of £60 and the threat of license points, which will blow any chance of the drivers obtaining any repeat cheap van insurance policy they currently hold, should also help to curb this spat of driving infringements.

The Environment Agency’s project manager underlined that the safety of the pedestrians and his contractors was ‘paramount’ as they undertake to complete this unavoidable work. The other issue his contractors have reported is traffic delays caused by van drivers shooting the lights and running into oncoming traffic along the single lane. It is no wonder that the ‘White Van Man‘ has such a poor reputation with this kind of fragrant law-breaking activity committed beneath the nose of an official government agency.

With automotive leaders calling for cheaper motor insurance across the board, this type of activity does little to fight their corner, only underlines insurance firms argument further that prices are high for a reason.

Mr Benedikz did extend his thanks to the majority of drivers who have been patient, given that the contractors have tried their utmost to reduce inconvenience; it is the handful of irresponsible van drivers racing against deadlines rather than accepting the reality of the situation that is the bane of the public, causing this outcry. Perhaps when they come to renew their van insurance and find that it is nowhere near as cheap as last time, the message will get through; let’s just hope nothing serious comes to fruition in the meantime.

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A happy ending thanks to a vehicle tracking system

One of the easiest ways to impress your van insurance broker when he’s assessing your application (and trying to wriggle out of passing on discounts) is listing your van’s security equipment. Not just your van, but you (or your drivers’), too. If you tick enough boxes, he’ll be unable to squirm out of offering you the cheapest van insurance within his portfolio.

An example of exactly this scenario – van security in practise, not a broker squirming, although I would have liked to have brought you evidence of that – happened only recently to, cannily enough, a security firm whose driver was van-jacked. It would have been pretty embarrassing if they didn’t have the appropriate security to enable cheap van insurance quotes, really, given that they go by the name of Delta Security. But they did and here’s a little tale of why you should consider extensive protection for your van and drivers such as GPS Tracking.

A Delta Security van driver was tootling along in slow-moving traffic, we’ll call him Roger Hirsch for the sake of the story…and because that was the driver’s name…when he got rammed from behind. Anybody who asks if his name was Roger Ramjet, stop now! No, it was Hirsch, like I said. Anyhoo…

…as you do, Roger weighed anchor and proceeded to check around the back to assess the damage caused by the dink, only to be greeted by two would-be pirates of the motorway. They do exist – read our article “Van insurance threatened by motorway pirates” – I’m not just building up to a Captain Pugwash gag; he wasn’t Roger the Cabin-boy and there will be neither any Seaman Staines nor any Master Bates in this tale, thank you, as urban legend suggests appeared in the BBC seventies show!

So, back to the tale. Roger was grounded by the first van thief whilst the second hopped into the cab that Roger had just vacated; our hero got back to his feet just in time to see his van disappear in the line of traffic that, one can only assume, had picked up pace. That would have been a hoot if the thieves had ‘…tore off at speeds of up to 3mph’, wouldn’t it? Class. But they didn’t and Roger was left all at sea.

Roger immediately dialled HQ, where Dave Mundy, the ops manager, ran to his laptop and booted up the Quartix tracking system at Roger’s behest. Lo and behold, there was Roger’s van, sans Roger, obviously, making its way towards Edmonton. In true American cop adventure stylee, Dave dialled 999 and continued to relay the van’s whereabouts to London Police as they gave hot pursuit of the stolen Transit.

And in true Hollywood fashion, by the time the police located the van, the pirates and, assumedly, a third operative driving the car from which the original two miscreants had pounced, were nowhere to be found. However, they had had the courtesy to lock the van, which was empty and, original dink aside, undamaged.

Dave puts the happy ending down the Quartix tracking system, which, like all good vehicle tracking systems, assists with fuel consumption, avoiding congestion charges and, especially in this instance, vehicle recovery; although the actions of Roger and the police were noted in the prologue, too.

The moral, of course, is, if you want to retain your cheap van insurance even after your van has been stolen by not having to make a claim that could dramatically affect your no claims bonus, you can either hire Roger, following his heroics in the face of real and terrible adversity or fit a vehicle tracking system that will not only get you discounted van insurance but will also give you the satisfaction that the money saved is going into your pocket and not that of the insurance broker.

(Sigh) The End.

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Enforcer halves number of young drivers without insurance

What a boon the Continuous Insurance Enforcement law has been for the Motor Insurer’s Bureau since its introduction three years ago. The new law, which now gives the MIB permission to access DVLA databases and cross-reference its records with their own has been accredited, at least in part, to a marked fall in the volume of youngsters on UK roads driving whilst uninsured.

This has got to be good news for those looking to budget for cheap van insurance this year and into the future. Alongside the role that comparison van insurance sites have played in helping bring down the cost of commercial vehicle cover, paying for other drivers who illegally take to the road without valid insurance was also blamed for the spiralling costs associated with van cover in recent times.

Keep up with your van insurance – you have been warned!

In the three years since its introduction, the act of cross-referencing DVLA records with insurance documentation and the means to do something about it has led to the number of drivers between 17 and 20 driving without cover being spliced in half, according to MIB figures. Incredibly, there are 1.2m uninsured drivers in the UK alone, of which approximately 120,000 are judged to be in this age range. Given those two statements, that’s 40,000 extra young drivers every year taking out insurance that otherwise wouldn’t be doing so since the EIC was introduced. Let’s hope that insurance companies plough that money back into the industry and start to offer van drivers, historically the safest group of drivers on the roads, the cheap van insurance they were used to before prices began their unchallenged climb.

The overall figure that driving without insurance is estimated to cost law-abiding citizens who do pay their premiums religiously is about £30 per policy, per person. According to Ashton West, CEO of MIB, that bill stands at roughly £400m per annum in additional costs to an industry in which many firms are financially delicately poised in light of the pay outs faced in recent times for an unprecedented rise in bogus whiplash injury claims and large scale crash-for-cash scams.

For young van drivers looking for cheap van insurance, all they can see is a chicken and egg syndrome. Young drivers can’t afford insurance, which, according to one recent report, suggests has risen 20% for the under-twenty-ones in twelve months, thus putting renewal policies beyond their reach; however, they still drive. In retaliation, or at least to balance the books, insurance firms increase policy prices and van insurance quotes to counteract the amount of young drivers ducking their insurance responsibility. Both instances combine to continually raise the cost for the professional young van driver making it harder for them to obtain affordable cover.

Let’s hope that the CIE continues to reduce the amount of young drivers who make up the 1.2m uninsured drivers on UK roads and address their pricing strategy, accordingly. To see how much you could save as a young driver looking for cheap van insurance, why not test our comparison site?  You may well save a packet in minutes; what have you got to lose?

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