Government lobbied for ‘mandatory’ telematics

The government has been urged to make telematics mandatory for young drivers.

With the Insurance Premium Tax (IPT) set to rise again, young drivers can be paying £2,000 annually in motor insurance. To combat this, the government has been urged to make drivers from 17-21 exempt from IPT while also making telematics compulsory.

Drivers with telematics devices are 20% less likely to have an accident than those without. Telematics provider Wunelli believes that compulsory telematics for young drivers would save the government millions of pounds as well as hundreds of lives.

Paul Stacy, founding director for Wunelli, said, ‘As the UK currently has no graduated licensing in place, it is crazy to think that young drivers can pass their test one day and the next day be driving a car full of people, on the motorway late at night. Even if they have traditional motor insurance, there is no way to monitor their driving behaviour in those crucial first few years.

‘Something as simple as installing a telematics device will promote safer driving and have a long-term impact on the amount of road traffic accidents that occur every single day. It would be logical to make these policies more affordable by excluding them from IPT in order to increase the popularity of telematics in the younger generation but we need to go a step further than this and make it mandatory in the high risk younger age group.’

Young drivers actually pay more than 12 times more than older drivers for every mile driven.

Paul continued, ‘Young drivers should be rewarded for taking out insurance and motivated to drive well, rather than be further penalised for their inexperience. Telematics should be the way to provide those most at risk with affordable insurance and incentivise them to drive safely.  It’s no coincidence that as telematics based insurance has increased in popularity in the UK, RTAs involving young people have fallen but we need to do much more to protect the lives of novice motorists today.’

 

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