Tag Archives: the EU

Insurers turn a blind eye to female fairness

As public sector cuts hit more women than men, UK insurers look set to make things worse by jumping on the gender bandwagon in December and charging women up to 25% more for their car insurance premiums in response to an EU ruling in the name of gender equality.

And why wouldn’t insurers do precisely this with the EU to blame, knowing that higher premiums for females mean higher profits for them (because women are the lesser gender risk and therefore cheaper to insure).

But what is our Government doing about this on behalf of women drivers? Not a lot it would appear…

Women bearing the brunt of our double dip recession

As things stand, women are suffering disproportionately in the jobless stakes and the number of female jobseekers has leapt to its highest rate in 23 years with more than a million women registered as unemployed in this country. This is a rise of 91,000 in a year, according to think tank IPPR and based on statistics released by the Office of National Statistics (ONS).

And they are losing their jobs at a much faster rate than men. For example, during the last three months in 2011, the female jobless rate rose by 33,000 compared to 16,000 for males, with 340,000 women having been unemployed for more than a year.

Oh that this would be the bottom of the trough but the situation looks likely to get even worse because women represent 80 per cent of the 710,000 public sector workers who are to be made redundant over the next five years. And one in 10 jobs is also forecast to be cut in local government where 75 per cent of the workforce is female.

And the Labour Party’s Yvette Cooper, the shadow Home Secretary, is already accusing Mr Cameron of having a “blind spot” when it comes to women’s issues: “As long as the Government is pushing women out of work, weakening action on the gender pay gap, reducing childcare and threatening to undermine maternity rights, they are making it harder, not easier, for women to work or to get promoted throughout their lives,” she said.

Could insurance price hikes be the female tipping point?

By allowing the EU to encourage insurers to penalise women drivers under cover of gender equality legislation, there is the real possibility that the Government will alienate previously loyal female voters simply because the cost of their motoring will soar.

Let’s remember that many women put up with poor public transport systems and depend on their cars for family, community and part time work as well as their personal independence.

If insurance premiums for women drivers rise by up to 25% and UK insurers can lay the blame on the EU, what is to stop women drivers from laying the blame in turn on the UK’s Government who seem to have done nothing to fend off this grossly unfair attack on UK females.

Ironically the EU motor insurance Directive calls itself a gender equality ruling and yet it is clearly discriminating against women drivers who have previously been entitled to lower car insurance premiums based on their lower risk.

If you’d like to subscribe to FOXY’s Insurance News, we’ll keep you posted.

Please also LIKE the Club’s Facebook page so we can share the latest developments and female feedback this summer.

FOXY

Fewer MOTs will cost UK lives

Just say no to the EU about MOTs

The EU is attempting to change our proven MOT regime and this WILL cost us lives and motor industry jobs if we let it.

I have posted about this subject before but I am now SERIOUSLY concerned that changes to our MOT system could get in through the UK’s back door as a result of our lethargy or simply as a result of our disbelief.

YES it CAN happen and if it does, it WILL affect road safety levels and cost us jobs in the UK motor industry if this change is allowed in via the Government’s back door.

Please read my campaigning blog at Confused.com about government plans to risk road safety.

After all, no-one really believed that the EU could tell UK insurers how to rate their car insurance risk when it comes to the gender of young men and women drivers. But this happened and will take effect in December 2012 without any noticeable sign of UK government protest, despite this flying in the face of statistical evidence (that women are the safer and therefore cheaper drivers to insure) and being totally unfair on females as a consequence.

In such instances the EU law is an ass and the UK government should have the guts to stand up and be counted where the harmonisation of bureaucracy to convenience EU officials is not in our country’s best interests. Rather than simply see it as a convenient cost saving sap for motorists…

And whilst women drivers are now to be expected to cough up to fill the coffers of UK car insurance companies (after a few lean years for them we are told) this proposed change about MOTs will cost us considerably more than just money. I’m talking about the cost of lives on our roads because our cars will be less safe if the EU gets its way here.

We must also realise that some 50,000 individuals are employed in the UK MOT industry so, potentially, half of these jobs could be at risk if the government approves a MOT regime every other year rather than every year as it stands at present.

Please read more about this via the Confused.com blog link and then join us at Facebook for progress news. Either FOXY Lady Drivers Club (for women drivers) or FOXY Choice (for trade members).

FOXY

‘All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.’     Edmund Burke.
And ‘good women’ we would add!

Admirable Admiral insurance results

Have I got this right?

Is there such a thing as a poor rather than rich insurance company?

One of the reasons I ask, if I heard this correctly in the first place, is because I distinctly remember reading that insurers hadn’t made money from car premiums for a good few years; all to do with accident claims and associated legal expenses apparently.

But this clearly isn’t the whole story as in the case of Admiral who have just declared pre-tax profits from January to June 2011 of £160.6m, up by a dramatic 27% compared with the same period last year. And total sales for these six months rose by more than 50% to pass the £1 billion turnover mark representing 3.15 million customers, up from 2.37 million in 2010.

Nowadays Admiral is a global insurance business, but these are the brand names most of us will recognise in the UK…

Admiral    Typically for those who pay higher than average premiums such as young drivers and those living in cities with higher risk ratings. Also offers multi vehicle policies.

Bell    Mainly for drivers with a Zero no claims bonus.

Diamond    As the song goes ‘Diamonds are a girl’s best friend’ and this Diamond sells insurance products to women.
NB: Whilst premiums are said to rise for females to meet EU equality demands from December 2012, will they need to when young men (the expensive risk) are unlikely to want to buy a product designed for females? So there is no reason to common-rate premiums surely…

elephant.co.uk    A wholly online car insurance service with lower overheads and prices as a result.

Confused.com    One of the best known UK insurance comparison websites including online quotes from all the major car insurance websites.

As impressive as all this profit is, we are told that Admiral’s loss ratio has increased significantly ie the amount paid out in claims divided by the amount collected in premiums to 77.5% in 2011 from 67.8% in the same six month period last year.

Could this be down to our bad weather last winter I wonder?

Needless to say I don’t know if this ratio is calculated before pre-tax profits are declared or after but I certainly wouldn’t describe Admiral as a ‘poor insurer’ which ever way the story gets told. But it’s likely that other insurers might be considerably less profitable because they aren’t as well run or as ambitious or they don’t have their own comparison website.

In which case I don’t think we motorists should be expected to shore up mediocre insurance providers with increased premiums. Let’s hope that the profitable businesses can afford to offer us more competitive premiums as a result; that’s what competition should be all about and if some can’t make the grade then it’s highly likely we won’t need them in future.

By all means explain the mechanics of all this to me if I have this wrong in my mind because the insurance industry is not as squeaky clean as it might be in my experience, especially when it comes to accident claims, high excesses and associated referral services.

Fortunately profitable insurance providers like Admiral can afford to lead the field through best practice and I hope they do just that. My particular interest is in seeing low motor insurance premiums for young female motorists in recognition of our (usually) safer driving record.

So I particularly object to the EU telling us what to do in our country as in ‘you must charge women and men the same insurance premiums’ masquerading as gender equality but which flies in the face of underwriting logic based on risk and experience.

Whatever makes the EU think they know what’s best for us; better than we know for ourselves?

FOXY

UK women drivers need an urgent voice in the EU

As the EU considers charging young women up to 25% more (some say 40% more) for their car insurance who is speaking out for the best interests of UK female motorists?

In my business I am allowed to price my product relative to demand, operating costs and the competition. Which is why most young women drivers get lower car insurance premiums than most young men, because they are the cheaper/safer sex for insurers to underwrite.

However, following a Belgian complaint about this practice, the Advocate General at the European Court of Justice, Juliane Kokott, believes that charging men and women different rates because of their sex violates anti-discrimination laws in a short-sighted gesture that is paying lip service to political correctness within the EU. So we should all be paying the same.

Mrs Kokott, a German mother of six for the record, has asked the Court to rule on the validity of an exemption clause to the Equal Treatment Directive and, if approved within the next month, this will quickly become EU law. All women in the UK may well end up paying more for car insurance cover, thus subsidising the expensive accidents that are mainly caused by young men.

Far from violating anti-discrimination laws, this is surely a case of positive discrimination against female drivers.

This reminds me of a heartfelt comment made by former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright:

‘There is a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.’

Few females seem such worthy candidates of this scorn as Mrs Kokott, regardless of the Court’s eventual judgement.

FOXY

If you feel strongly about this and can add ideas, weight and communications reach to a FOXY campaign, please email info@foxyladydrivers.com