Temporary car insurance for young drivers

If you have just passed your test and have recklessly bought a new car but forgot about the insurance, or your insurance has been delayed for some reason, you can get temporary insurance cover which will cover you and your car and other vehicles and passengers while you are ‘in-between’ insurance policies. Ideally of course this shouldn’t happen, but we don’t, unfortunately live in an ideal world.

There are other times when you may need temporary insurance cover; for example if you borrow a friend’s car for the weekend or hire a car, then you will need temporary insurance cover, unless you are a named driver on your friend’s policy. Can’t just borrow a car for whatever reason and not take out an insurance policy that will cover you in the event of an accident. Remember that it is an offence to drive a vehicle on British roads without insurance.

If you are a named driver on your parents’ policy because this is the cheaper option for you, don’t forget that you will need extra insurance to drive a car other than that specified on your or your parents’ policy. Insurance companies will give you instant insurance if you go online which will cover you if you are borrowing a car for a day or a couple of weeks. In fact you can get temporary insurance cover from 1 day to 28 days.

A temporary driver can also be added to an existing policy for a maximum of 14 days, and if the need is still there for that driver to drive the car he or she can be re-added for a further 14 days. After that the temporary driver should be added as a named driver to the policy.

One word of warning; when you apply for temporary insurance cover, tell the insurer the truth. Don’t be tempted to lie as a way of reducing the costs of the insurance cover. If you have lied or falsified information, then if you had an accident, the insurance company would be within its rights not to pay a penny to anyone. This could leave you in desperate circumstances, especially if someone outside your car was injured or killed. This is really not a situation you would want to find yourself in.

Insurance companies are not ogres and they understand that young drivers need temporary insurance because they have not got their own policies because of the prohibitive costs. Temporary cover can be got for around three pounds a day, so won’t break the bank. If you are going to borrow a car for a few days, shop around and get the best deal you can for temporary insurance cover.