Uninsured Drivers In The UK

Uninsured Drivers in the UK

In the UK it’s a legal requirement for drivers to insure their cars before driving them. Regardless of this some people still decided to drive without insurance. Road traffic accidents can already present you with a wide range of problems and cause a lot of stress, this is only amplified if another party involved doesn’t have a valid insurance policy.

You’ll have fears that you may lose your no claims bonus or have to pay for repairs to your car out of your own pocket. Thankfully more and more insurance companies now protect your no claims bonus should you be involved in an accident with an insured driver.

It’s thought that over 1 million cars are driven in the UK without valid insurance. The Motor Insurers’ Bureau analysis revealed that in London one in eight cars are uninsured which earns the capital the title of the worst place for uninsured driving in the UK. This is causing insurance premiums to rise for those who do choose to get valid insurance, which in turn could be causing more people to drive uninsured due to the high costs.

The trouble is the police simply doesn’t have enough time or resources to catch all those driving without insurance. There has been an increasing number of calls for the police to turn to modern Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) to increase the number of drivers being caught. The technology to read number plates is widely available and already used to monitor drivers speeds, simple modifications to the system could see more cameras checking if cars are insured. This technology is already used in some places and could be rolled out easily and effectively.

What should you do if you have an accident with an uninsured vehicle?

As with all accidents the information you gather immediately can prove vital in securing the maximum amount of compensation. To ensure you have the best chance of a successful compensation claim you should:

Report the incident to the police

Any road traffic accident should be reported to the police within 24 hours of the occurrence. This is no different if the other driver doesn’t hold a valid insurance policy. It would be useful to inform the police that another party involved didn’t have insurance when reporting the accident. If a report is not made to the police within 24 hours it may be impossible to make a successful claim.

Collect details

Whenever you’re involved in a road traffic accident you should gather the details of the other parties involved. This should include their name, address and contact details of the driver and any passengers in their vehicle at the time.

If anyone saw the accident occur gather their name, address and contact details, this should help us prove who was at fault and caused the accident.

Document evidence

If possible you should document as much evidence as possible, this will help us prove the accident occurred and the cars which were involved. Pull out your phone and either start taking photos or video the scene of the crash, capture the number plates of all cars involved and try and match the cars to their driver. You should also try to gather as much of the following list as possible:

• Details of when the accident took place (date and time)
• Details of where the accident took place (which road etc)
• Road conditions- for example, the weather at the time of the accident, the road signs, the visibility, whether the other car had lights on or not
• Details of damage- this includes damage to both your car and the other vehicles involved in the accident
• Sketch of the accident scene outlining where point of contact was
• Anything that the other driver said at the scene – this information can be important at a later date if legal proceedings were to occur
• Any police report numbers