Insurance Risk

[surveyor]

What's the group opinion here as to who is the riskiest driver in insurance terms? All other ways equal eg car, address etc.

Someone with 9 years NCB who drives 5,000 miles a year
Someone with 9 years NCB who drives 30,000 miles a year

[Snollygoster]

Hard one.

Although one would assume someone driving 30,000 is on the road more, they should be up to a better driving standard with experience. However, this can also be subject to possibly a high lack of concentration as driving is more of habit, and may not pay full attention.

You are also on the road 6 times as long as someone doing 5,000, and you also need to factor in a non fault claim from other drivers on the road users.

Overall, I would say the more miles, a higher risk.

[vikingaero]

It's exposure to risk. A 30k driver will encounter more potential incidents.

[ging84]

You have missed out a person or 2 here
you've missed out the person who for some reason has asked for 2 quotes for the same car with very different mileages.

[Rick101]

You would assume the 30K driver was the higher risk but as we all know insurance risk assessments have their own logic.

[BugLebowski]

Have you been playing about with insurance quotes?

Logically the driver doing less miles should be less of a risk to provide a years insurance for than the driver doing high miles.

If both drivers have an equal chance of having an accident per mile driven, then the high mileage driver would be 6 times more likely to have an accident in a single year.

Insurance quotes can rely on black magic at times though.

[grumbas]

It's a debate that splits the industry, you'll get an underwriter argue both camps, which is why you see very different prices, particularly from brokers.

The truth is probably if you pull in other factors eg occupation you can get the loss stats to prove either to be preferable...

[thelawnet]

Since you ask, for me, insuring a 320d worth £11k:

1,000 miles - £339
5,000 miles - £315
10,000 miles - £369
20,000 miles - £412
30,000 miles - £425
40,000 miles - £447
50,000 miles - £441
100,000 miles - £449

5,000 is the sweet spot. More, or fewer, miles will increase the premium. In the case of more - just more hours on the road is more risk, common sense really, and in the case of less, I guess people who don't drive very often tend to be worse drivers.

[surveyor]

My counter theory is that when looking at standard of driving

Driver 1 has done 45,000 miles with no accidents.
Driver 2 has done 270,000 miles in the same time period with no accidents...

[TwigtheWonderkid]

Some insurers, especially when insuring young drivers, will charge less for a higher declared mileage. This is because their experience tells them that young drivers often lie to get their premium down, and a young driver admitting to a high mileage is clearly not a liar, and honest people make less claims.

Young drivers who declare low mileage as a group will contain all the liars (plus a few honest low mileage young drivers) and hence more claims will come from that group.