Do you tell your insurance company of mods?

[Richak]

Many years ago I did some internal audit work for a vehicle bodyshop. Whenever an insurance job came in there was always a questionnaire that the Insurance company asked the bodyshop to fill in - basically it was a series of questions to try and wriggle out of paying such as "what are the tread depths on each tyre", "Is there evidence that the vehicle has been regulalry serviced", "what modifications have been fitted to the vehicle", "Is the damage present consistent with the owners claim that X occurred". Not sure if they still do this, be surprised if they didn't.

 

[Spinal]

I don't know the situation with tyres but I would hope a sensible approach is taken whereby, as long as the tyre is the correct size for the wheels on the car and it meets relevant laws (i.e. is not sub-standard), it would not affect one's insurance?

They certainly never ask me about tyres when insuring...

Mine was running on crap budgets when I bought it and now runs on MPS3s - which provide an improvement in grip the size of the universe.

BBC News - Insurance companies 'charging more for winter tyres'

Also some threads on here...
M.

 

[Moonie]

Many years ago I did some internal audit work for a vehicle bodyshop. Whenever an insurance job came in there was always a questionnaire that the Insurance company asked the bodyshop to fill in - basically it was a series of questions to try and wriggle out of paying such as "what are the tread depths on each tyre", "Is there evidence that the vehicle has been regulalry serviced", "what modifications have been fitted to the vehicle", "Is the damage present consistent with the owners claim that X occurred". Not sure if they still do this, be surprised if they didn't.

I'm sure they do. I had a prang 2 years ago (caught a bollard at work) When I took it to the body shop they photographed everything - engine bay, even the tax disc, and took tyre tread depths.

 

[Starky]

Just got a quote for insurance, stipulating that I intened to put mods on the car (pully and map.) its gone from £892 to £1750. To me that sounds like a big jump, what are your thoughts?

 

[markjay]

Just got a quote for insurance, stipulating that I intened to put mods on the car (pully and map.) its gone from £892 to £1750. To me that sounds like a big jump, what are your thoughts?

Phone around. You will get widely ranging quotes from different insurers.

The whole thing does sound arbitrary, but I am sure that there's some precise science somewhere in the background that we mere mortals simply can't comprehend....

 

[sinewave]

Some companies treat Mods as a Cash Cow with little chance of rival competition.


Example.... 30 year old Female, Full NCD nice post code, no points etc

1) Standard E320 Sport £420

2) Above, mapped, bigger wheels, uprated suspension etc £850

3) Standard E63 £595!



Forget the Mods, buy the real deal in the first place!

 

[Spinal]

I think part of the issue is the lack of transparency in the market. It takes about 5 minutes to enter your details into a comparison site to compare just about every insurer for non-modified cars; competition is harsh.

On the other hand, for modifications, you need to physically call insurers. There is no hard and fast "A is cheaper than B" comparison; so they can charge what they want. Partly because they can get away with it (the cynical in me says) and partly because they themselves can't see what their competition is charging...

M.

 

[BTB 500]

You can declare mods. on price comparison sites - I just insured the SL (declaring the AMG alloys and modified exhaust) via confused.com. However I 'only' got about 25 quotes from the 130 companies searched, so mods. do limit your options to some extent.

 

[whitemercedes]

No i dont tell my insurance. my insurance would go through the roof.

 

[Beardz]

Yes.

So why don't I need to and the people without traders policy do?

Because a traders policy covers any motor vehicle in your custody or control

There is no way you can know what (if any) modifications have been carried out to a customers vehicle.

 

[bpsorrel]

Would you mention a change of wheel "style" - not size? Basically I changed from multi spoke 18s to 5 spoke 18s on my CLS. Would this be regarded as a mod? I've never mentioned it... (actually, the multis it came with were an option so it could be said I've changed back to original! )

 

[renault12ts]

You buy a car, it has alloys on it...but it came from the factory with steels. You are asked if it has mods...you say no. So, are you in the wrong? Would the insurance company have a get out clause if they needed it? Besides people like us...few would know that even if the car had alloys...those ones are AMGs.

The answer for major insurers is, you are not wrong, they will not hold it against you. But go to a cheap and cheerful, never heard of them before company...and buyer beware.

 

[bpsorrel]

Also, if you buy a modded car and restore it to original, would you mention that?

 

[markjay]

You must answer the insurer's question to your best knowledge, but you are not expected to carry-out forensic investigations... if you bought a second hand car and you were unaware of the wheels not being original, then that's fine.

As for mods, simply ask the insurer, to remove doubt. That's what I did when Alfie retrofitted COMAND on my car, and Aviva said no problem - in fact they even said they'll cover it under the existing policy.

There are a few issues with not declaring mods, and they have been covered before, but the result is that the insurer may claim that due to deliberate misinformation on your part, they were unable to correctly asses the risk and calculate your premium - meaning you did not pay the correct premium for your circumstances and your insurance is null. This will also land you in trouble with the police for technically driving without insurance...

Keep in mind that the insurers do not make their risk calculation algorithm public. In the same way that they may have worked out that say teachers have less claims than say builders, they could argue that their statistics show that people who modify their cars are more likely to make claims. If you keep material information from them, they simply can not work out your premium correctly.

Of course this is a worst case scenario, these things will only get looked at if you have a major claim.

 

[Paul/]

I know someone who has declared engine mods, but is concerned that the absence of a Cat- required for MOT certification- might tenuously be argued as an excuse to not pay out on claims.

 

[markjay]

I know someone who has declared engine mods, but is concerned that the absence of a Cat- required for MOT certification- might tenuously be argued as an excuse to not pay out on claims.

Not sure that valid MoT is a requirement for the policy to be valid.

If you let your MoT lapse and drive the car, you would be uninsured.

 

[BTB 500]

I know someone who has declared engine mods, but is concerned that the absence of a Cat- required for MOT certification- might tenuously be argued as an excuse to not pay out on claims.

Has he declared a modified exhaust system (not the same thing as engine mods)?

 

[Paul/]

"If you let your MoT lapse and drive the car, you would be uninsured"- covered there, still keeps the original system for refitting for the MOT.

"Has he declared a modified exhaust system (not the same thing as engine mods)?"- not sure how specific his declaration was- basically a letter from the garage that did the mods, explaining that there was a resultant X% power increase, within the recognised capability of the standard chassis, brakes etc"- sounds like might need to be more specific.

 

[BTB 500]

My SL's centre muffler delete is declared as something like "non-standard exhaust/manifold" (there are other categories for engine mods. etc.). They weren't interested in what the power gain (if any) there was. But obviously this can vary from company to company, so if in any doubt list the specific changes made.

 

[markjay]

My SL's centre muffler delete is declared as something like "non-standard exhaust/manifold" (there are other categories for engine mods. etc.). They weren't interested in what the power gain (if any) there was. But obviously this can vary from company to company, so if in any doubt list the specific changes made.

When I considered a remap, Aviva were only interested in the advertised bhp gain (which tend to be higher than the actual bhp you are likely to get...).

The quoted addition to the premium wasn't significant however (though in the end I did not go ahead with the remap for other reasons).