Van insurance news roundup: 7 days ending 28 Feb 2014:
Car insurance and van insurance customers just can’t seem to win this week with the amount of fraud that just came to light once more, driving up costs for all.
New data indicates that more than 1,000 motorists are victimised every week by fraudsters staging crashes. In fact there have been around 300,000 ‘cash for crash’ saged road traffic accidents since 2008, ruining the day of countless drivers and giving insurers – and their customers – massive headaches in the form of hiked premium prices.
Fraudsters know who just to target, too, when it comes to their criminal pursuits. Turns out that women and younger Brits are a specific favourite, which turns into a case of chicken or the egg as these classes of drivers are often accused of being statistically more likely to be involved in an accident. Is it that scammers are targeting these motorists because of these statistics or if they’re causing these statistics in the first place? Can you even believe it?
Then again there’s even more to complain about when it comes to fraud levels this week. Just when you thought that the criminal behaviour is confined to gangs of fraudsters roaming the country’s motorways and crashing into lorries to drive up commercial van insurance premiums, it turns out that there was a positively massive security breach at major insurer Aviva.
Apparently two former Aviva employees – long since sacked, thanks goodness – stand accused of making off with tens of thousands of the personal records of policyholders that have been involved in an accident of some kind. They’ve taken these records and allegedly have sold them on to claims management companies who then have turned around and begun to solicit these accident victims to bring RTA claims
So yes, apparently there’s no honour amongst thieves – or those who profit from thievery. It’s one thing to have organised fraud rings smashing into you at roundabouts but now you’ve got ambulance-chasing claims management companies coming after you and pestering you to allow them to make claims on your behalf! All of this claims activity just drives up premiums even further of course, so don’t be surprised if your annual cover gets a lot more expensive any time soon.