Can a car be insured twice

thexav

Pro Tuner
Staff member
Points
407
Car
2002 Clio 172
Is it possible for two people to take out insurance on the same car effectively making it insured twice.

The reason is that one driver doesn't want to jeaperdise the no claims bonus of the car owner if the worst happened so he thought of taking out his own policy on the car to cover him driving it.

I was told you can't do this but surely there must be a way round this.
 
I suppose it's possible to have two policies in force simultaneously but when a claim is submitted it's likely to cause problems if both underwriters are aware of each other. Waynne could help out here with his insurance background, but I think this would be called double indemnity.

The result is that the insurance companies will argue incessantly about who is liable for what proportion of the claim (proportionate liability??).

I like the idea though, but I suspect that it's frowned upon.
 
There are issues here. Dual insurance generally causes debate as to which company is liable for paying out, a 50% from each usually happens here. It causes no end of delay and debate. Both companies need to decide on the repair or write off costs which is not easy.

If a car is parked and rolls down the hill due to a badly maintained handbrake is this down to the driver or the owner? (There is a legally defined answer to this but I'm using it to highlight the complexities here.)

Some policies also specify that if a loss is covered elsewhere then it will not be covered under this policy!

Attempting to make the same claim twice is Fraud, it will always be detected and will lead to prosecution.

There is also the issue of insurable interest. You can't insure your neighbours car, set light to it and claim for it as you have no insurable interest in the car. Spouses can insure their partners car though as all assets owned in a marriage are considered joint.

You can draft up a contract to cover insurable interest and outline the conditions under which the driver is liable for arranging his own cover. Generally if the damage occurs whilst in his custody or control he is personally liable for it.

Any insurer must be informed and given a chance to see this contract.

There are options now where a driver can take out cover for another car. Temporary policies offer a good solution here but cost quite a bit long term. They are acceptable to most insurers and in most situations.
 
Attempting to make the same claim twice is Fraud

How so? If you've paid for something to be insured multiple times then why could you not reap the rewards?

Doesn't seem like claiming twice would cause any harm/loss to anyone involved, 2 insurers are getting paid to cover something, 2 insurers cough up!
 
It is Fraud! :) When you are paid for your loss then you can't claim again for the same loss as it's quite simply no longer a loss. At best you'd get half the claim from each insurer.

Over insurance is still limited to the value of the loss. Valuing a cars insurance value on a car worth £5000 as £10000 and paying extra to cover this will still only net a £5000 payout when claiming - the amount of your loss.
 

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