Carry (copy of) your insurance with you or ...

[league67]

Uninsured cars should be seized and crushed at the road side. Clearly if the driver insists he is insured then as Plodd has pointed out the Police have mobile telephones, if hte driver is lying then prosecute them for attempting to pervert the course of justice.
John

And if they crush wrong car ? Oh well, errors do happen. But who is going to pay for the error ? Imagine the outrage on wasting taxpayers money. PNC or whatever that system is called is prone to errors. Full stop. There should be a bullet-proof method of checking before they impound your car. Full stop.

They certainly do have mobile phones. Question is are they going to be bothered to ring insurance company and check, even if they are told who are insurers ? My experience says; no.

Its very easy to say oh what the heck at least they are saving us from uninsured drivers. Are they. The time they spent 'dealing' with me could of been put to better use.

 

[glojo]

And if they crush wrong car ?

Hi league67,
I have put forward the provisio of communicating with the insurance company, if the insurance company then states the driver is not insured with them are you seriously suggesting the officer takes the word of the driver instead??

What is your alternative suggestion?

It is so easy to say something is wrong, but to have credibility you must surely put forward a better option.

Why were you stopped?

John

 

[nick mercedes]

Uninsured cars should be seized and crushed at the road side. Clearly if the driver insists he is insured then as Plodd has pointed out the Police have mobile telephones, if hte driver is lying then prosecute them for attempting to pervert the course of justice. I am referring to the gentleman that tried it on with the car that had the larger engine in it.

John

1 How would you crush a car at the roadside?

2 What happens if the police computer makes a mistake?

 

[glojo]

1 How would you crush a car at the roadside?

2 What happens if the police computer makes a mistake?

Did you read all of my message????

In answer to 1. I believe there are already facilities for this? but it might not be for uninsured vehicles.


John

 

[Plodd]

And if they crush wrong car ? Oh well, errors do happen. But who is going to pay for the error ? Imagine the outrage on wasting taxpayers money. PNC or whatever that system is called is prone to errors. Full stop. There should be a bullet-proof method of checking before they impound your car. Full stop.

There is a long delay before a car is crushed so that shouldn't happen. And the decent cars are sold on anyhow.

They certainly do have mobile phones. Question is are they going to be bothered to ring insurance company and check, even if they are told who are insurers ? My experience says; no.

You have experience of 1 stop. I have personally seized dozens of cars and been present when hundreds have been seized and I say yes they do.

Its very easy to say oh what the heck at least they are saving us from uninsured drivers. Are they. The time they spent 'dealing' with me could of been put to better use.

So getting uninsured cars off the road isn't a worthwhile use of my time?

 

[Swiss Toni]

Its very easy to say oh what the heck at least they are saving us from uninsured drivers. Are they. The time they spent 'dealing' with me could of been put to better use.

??????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[league67]

....

glojo
The ONLY reason the car was stopped was that it appeared on computer as not insured.

plodd
Yes , I had one experience and one too many. It would of taken total of 2 mins flat for them to ring insurance and me to get on my way. I have NEVER objected at being stopped. I object at police blindly following what-if diagram.
In other 43 mins they could actually get NON-INSURED car of the road.

swiss-toni.
English not being my 1st language I sometime fail to explain things properly.
Time that it would take to confirm that car is insured = 2mins. Seizing car, writing report, producer and everything else + waiting for tow truck = 45mins.

 

[glojo]

glojo
The ONLY reason the car was stopped was that it appeared on computer as not insured.

Hi league67,
Thank you very much for taking the time to respond. Many apologies if you think your being picked on, I am positive that is not happening, you are just getting a lot of replies.

It is most unfortunate that the Police did not simply contact the insurance company (as per my first message) We all have different ideas on how to speak to each other and it could be the Police officer was having a bad day, or it could be that something\someone rubbed this officer up the wrong way? I wasn't there, so I have no idea. I do know that there is always two sides to every story.

I have no time for anyone that drives without insurance, and strangely enough I do NOT have much time for 'some' Police Traffic Officers, but we all have jobs to do, and I find that if I am polite, courteous and perhaps helpful, then any meetings I have with the strong arm of the law is usually a pleasant experience.

Hopefully you accept that your car deserved to be stopped if it was 'flagged' as not being insured?

The scenario then went pear shaped. Words were clearly exchanged?? (no idea by who) and perhaps there was a misunderstanding.

You have made an issue of the car being taxed 20 days before you were stopped, but in fairness to everyone that is meaningless! You only need insurance on the day the car is being taxed? Until my son was checked by our local Police I had NO idea how quickly insurance data can be put onto the Police Computer. I was amazed that it was added in less than 24hrs and on the week-end?? I am still surprised over this. I accept this might not always happen, and hopefully the Police can very quickly contact an insurance company to sort out any query?

I stand by my statement about crushing or perhaps disposing of uninsured cars, and I note it has been queried, but obviously common sense would prevail. If someone insists their vehicle is insured then it needs to be thoroughly checked out and if they have lied then as I said previously prosecute them for attempting to pervert the course of justice. Fining someone £120 for no insurance is pointless. Seize the vehicle, confiscate it. Shoot the driver, hang them. Send them off to Australia!!

John
Sunny Torquay

 

[Swiss Toni]

I think it is pretty clear that the Cops made a mistake when they seized your car and the effect it has had on your view of them is, perhaps predictably, not good.

The legislation is sound, the Police Powers are appropriate, the application of them needs not only appropriate control & guidance, but also discretion on the part of the individual Officer...

"If only" is a great and somewhat over-used phrase, but there are any number of points where your experience could have been turned around into something more positive (but wasn't).

And for what it is worth...

Some insurance companies get the data onto the (ABI initiated) database very quickly, others do not subscribe at all.

I note that there is another thread running about "How do I find out if my brothers wife has car insurance", well, it would appear the answer is - you call each insurance company and claim to be a Cop who has stopped said person and ask if she is insured.

To be honest, and I appreciate where this might clash with Plodds view, I am not comfortable with someone calling up an insurance company, claiming to be Plodd and asking about my insurance...

An interesting debate, but at the end of the day, the Cops are seizing dozens of uninsured cars and making my drive to work safer. So I am happy.

BTW - read about a brand-new S-Class getting seized last month - it turns out it belonged to the owner of an Indian Restaurant who let his employees go out for a ride (well, deliver Take-Aways actually) and they got stopped and weren't insured....
I am pretty sure the owner paid his fee and got his car sharpish!!!

 

[glojo]

you call each insurance company and claim to be a Cop who has stopped said person and ask if she is insured.

What an excellent and very valid point.

Is there also data protection issues??

John

 

[Plodd]

To be honest, and I appreciate where this might clash with Plodds view, I am not comfortable with someone calling up an insurance company, claiming to be Plodd and asking about my insurance...

Why? The only question I want answered is "Is Mr XXX insured to drive motor vehicle ABC 123A". Nothing more.

A few weeks back I seized a 54 reg BMW X5. It belonged to the mother of the young man driving. She was away for the week and he was having fun in his mothers car for the weekend with her permission. He claimed to be covered as he was a named driver on his employers trader policy. He was indeed a named driver, the problem arose because the policy only covered vehicles in the custody, care or control of the policy holder. Ooops.

 

[Dieselman]

It must be something to do with BMW drivers. Yesterday I saw a 3 series that had been stopped. What a sad sight seeing them emptying their shopping out of the car for the walk home.

 

[Swiss Toni]

I fully understand how it would work and think that its fine for the Cops to check everything is legal.

I just don't like the idea of my insurance company confirming or giving out information about me and my vehicle to any TomDickHarry.

Plodd - I am a very nasty stalker (well, shuffler ) and I think that this SL belongs to that pretty blonde I saw. I see it has a Direct Line Tax Disc Holder (I'd make a great 'tec ).

I phone Direct Line and say "Hi, I am Plodd, does Miss Luverly have cover to drive this nice car?".

"She does?" Great.

I think you should be able to do it.

Just not everyone who wants to be you. And reading the entries on the "Specials" forum posted on another thread, motivation for doing "The Job" seems a little (ahem) suspect in places.

 

[219]

The whole thing could be very easily solved if , besides the tax disc , you got an insurance disc to put in your windscreen and a MOT disc which would prove at a glance that a car complied with the three basic pieces of documentation required .

It would simply be a disc with the name of the insurance co , the policy no , the make , colour & reg no of the vehicle and the expiry date/time .

Similarly with a MOT disc.

With everything being done by computer these days , the cost would be minimal to have MOT and insurance certificates changed to that there was a disc-sized tear out section in one corner which would be removed & displayed on every car windscreen .

This would mean that Plodd , or a parking warden , could check at a glance if a vehicle was taxed/MOT'd/insured and , in the event of an accident , the details would be visible for involved parties to exchange on the spot .

The discs would NOT need to display any personal information about the owner , but if a car was stopped and the driver was not the registered owner then Plodd would still be able to phone up , quoting the policy no and find out who was covered (or does this information come up from the database when a check is made ?)

Glojo , I would also sense that there might be data protection issues here in as much as Joe Bloggs could phone up claiming to be Plodd and asking for information about your or my insurance but this could possibly be sorted by the request going via the police control room and the insurance calling THEM back (or phoning their local Police Station the number of which they would have) so they know who they are giving information to , I don't think any of us have a problem with the police legitimately checking someone is insured , but no one wants Tom , **** or Harry poing their noses into our business .

 

[glojo]

The whole thing could be very easily solved if , besides the tax disc , you got an insurance disc to put in your windscreen and a MOT disc

This is something we have discussed at great length, and my ideal is to do away completely with the tax disc!! Think of all the money that could be saved by getting rid of the bureaucracy behind the issuing, enforcement. Simply put ANOTHER tax onto the fuel, then everyone that uses a car cannot avoid making a contribution. The MOT could be in the shape of a tax disc and there must be a way of having a small insurance disc that can be displayed in conjunction with the MOT. I suppose the ideal would be to combine the insurance with the MOT?????? (That's a question, not a suggestion)

John

 

[219]

I wouldn't have a problem with the RFL duty going on fuel as long as it didn't become another stealth tax . The only other gripe is , as a classic car owner with an exempt vehicle , I would lose out as I can't see the gov't giving tose of us with classic cars a refund of duty .

I don't think it would be practical to combine MOT and insurance , for all sorts of reasons . You can have one policy covering several cars which may need MOT'd at different times or not at all because they may be under 3 years old . You may have a car MOT'd but not in use and not insured . Dealers will have cars with current MOTs which have no specific insurance running . People buy and sell cars midway through the term of insurance ....etc...etc.

I do think it is very practical to have some small visible evidence of 1) tax , 2) insurance 3) MOT in the windscreen

These could be discs or they could even be credit card sized cards with a magnetic stripe on them . It would probably be easier to incorporate a credit card sized tear off 'mini certificate' into the corner of the MOT and insurance certificate and it would be very easy to make it a legal requirement to display this .They could be printed with basic details so that parking wardens or people involved in an accident could do a visual check but could also have a magnetic stripe so that they could be swiped by the Police during a roadside check . The technology is also there to make a card with a datatag which could be interrogated through the glass .

If it was made a requirement to have something in the windscreen , just like the tax disc , then there would be no antics : you're not displaying card/disc , your car gets lifted .

If the tax disc was made credit card sized too , then it would take up very little space in the corner of the windscreen to dispaly all three cards in a plastic holder designed for the purpose .

 

[nick mercedes]

The whole thing could be very easily solved if , besides the tax disc , you got an insurance disc to put in your windscreen and a MOT disc which would prove at a glance that a car complied with the three basic pieces of documentation required .

It would simply be a disc with the name of the insurance co , the policy no , the make , colour & reg no of the vehicle and the expiry date/time .

That's how it is on Jersey:

http://www.cab.org.je/submenu_page_view.php?menu_id=53&submenu_id=378

 

[glojo]

1) insurance 2) MOT in the windscreen

My preferred options are those two. Regarding classic car exemption, that unfortunately is a personal issue, taxing fuel would get the thousands if not hundreds of thousand of current tax dodgers. The system is expensive to run, expensive to enforce and totally unnecessary.

I suggested the combined MOT\insurance purely to generate debate, it has certainly done that and all your points are valid and very well put.

John

 

[Plodd]

An insurance disc would be about as much use as carrying the certificate around with you. i.e. very little.

We regularly find people who insure their cars and get a certificate. They then either cancel it or just fail to make any payments but forget to return the certificate as requested. The new MIB database sorts these guys out nicely. It would be exactly the same with an insurance disc. They would get the disc and forget to pay or return it.

 

[glojo]

An insurance disc would be about as much use as carrying the certificate around with you. i.e. very little.

You always get someone that comes up with a sensible observation

Is there a better alternative than what is being done at present?

John