What a difference a set of tyres can make to a car!

[KozmoNaut]

I feel like a right bastard for at least partially placing blame on the victims in these frauds, but...

It has been recently reported that there is a new staged scam on the roads known as ‘flash for cash’. This involves a driver on a main road flashing their lights inviting a driver waiting on a side road to pull out, at which point they speed up, causing the victim to drive into the side of the car. They then claim that the victim pulled out without checking first.

Never EVER rely on other motorists to direct traffic. Only the police are authorized to direct traffic. Like in this situation, if you act on another motorist's directions in traffic, you can be held accountable for resulting accidents. At least, that's how it goes here, I assume the laws are similar in the UK (and the rest of the EU, for that matter).

This is similar to the ‘crash for cash’ scam where criminal gangs fake or deliberately cause accidents to make fraudulent insurance claims, usually claiming for injuries, vehicle damage, replacement vehicle hire, loss of earnings and other costs. The Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB) estimates that the cost of this scam for all drivers will add around £50 to the average premium per year.

By far the most common of these cases are scammers suddenly braking hard, causing others to rear-end them. Again, the blame lies at least partly with the victim in these cases. If someone braking in front of you causes you to hit them from behind, you were not giving them proper following distance. It is always your responsibility to maintain safe following distance. A dash cam can help combat cases where the scammer swoops right in front of you before braking.

The sheer cheek of using these kinds of situations to drive up insurance rates is astounding, especially considering how the insurance companies apparently aren't doing their duty in identifying and combating scams. It would be much better to teach people actual traffic laws instead of overcharging them on insurance.

[Welly]

My biggest fear now is someone pulling a stunt like this on my car because I know it will be instantly written off I've spent so much time, money and effort getting my car 'right' it would be a crying shame to see it scrapped. I drive with extreme caution in cities now.

Example: You know how you wait to pull out onto a main road.....a car approaches from the right (UK) and indicates to turn, so you could assume they will turn before you and you are free to pull out? no, I don't - I wait for them to complete the turn just in case they were indicating wrongly.

It annoys the car behind me but that's the benefit of driving a Volvo; I can drive like a demented old fart and get away with it. I annoyed another driver the other day (along similar lines) so he tried to overtake his car looked quite nice as it got smaller and smaller in my mirror

[highlander]

The insurance companies are complicit in this though - they SELL your personal details to claims management (NO WIN NO FEE ambulance-chasing leeches) without your express permission, and they simply list the extra money they receive as "referral fees". Well, they did until very recently, as the government finally did ban this practise.

Doesn't stop it from happening though.

Also - why does my job title influence how much I should pay for my car insurance? This makes by piss boil. If I put my job title in as "DATA PROCESSOR" instead of "IT CONSULTANT", it can make a difference of £40 a year.

Also - why does my car insurance for my 12-year-old, 2.2 petrol, 160 HP Peugeot 406 Coupe cost *TWICE* as much as my brother's does on his 6-year-old, 4.2 supercharged V8, 420 HP Jaguar XKR? He's 3 years older than me, but I passed my test a year before he did. We both live in the same city, and neither of us in dangerous areas. I don't buy the "Peugeot parts prices are too high" crap, because I can't imagine body panels/etc on a £70k V8-powered Grand Tourer are cheaper to replace than those on a relatively mass-produced 4-seat Coupe. Neither of us have any convictions (motoring or otherwise). Neither of us have had an at-fault claim in the last 5 years. We've both had declared mods on our cars (his old Seat Leon Cupra R had a lot of performance work done on it, all declared). We both work in IT (he in UNIX support, me in Network support). We're both married. We both do around 6,000 miles a year.

They make it up as they go along, and don't tell you how they came up with their pricing. It's all bollocks, they've got us all by the crown jewels, and hell, the government aren't exactly going to step in because if insurance prices are high, the insurance taxes they collect are going to be high (= more money for duck houses, battlement repairs, and at-taxpayers'-expense pornography).

I repeat, it's all bollocks.

* and... breathe... *

[Welly]

You're married to your Brother?

[steve_earwig]

A dash cam can help combat cases where the scammer swoops right in front of you before braking.

Pr where they've disabled the brake lights...

At least Pug insurance isn't any more expensive than everything else in Croatia, it's all ludicrously expensive across the board and calculated using the initial purchase price (so doesn't take into account any depreciation differences) and power output (so they don't take into account power-to-weight ratio differences either )

[highlander]

You're married to your Brother?

That would be "no"

[Welly]

You're married to your Brother?

That would be "no"

Thanks for the confirmation.