Buying car insurance for a short period only
Ever wondered whether you could get a temporary car insurance cover for that estate car you need to borrow from your friend to help you move houses? Well you will be glad to know that such a short term car insurance policy exists! So instead of driving without car insurance hoping nothing bad will happen, put your mind at peace and get protected against all the odds.
Circumstances when you may need this short term insurance policy
- Driving your friend's car for the weekend
- Borrowing your friend's van when moving houses
- Buying something which doesn't fit in your car because the latter is too small
- You are not insured to drive someone else's car but you badly need to
- You are not covered when driving abroad (holidays perhaps?)
- You are hiring a car/van which doesn't come with rental insurance
- Temporarily letting an additional driver (son/niece etc) using your car
- Driving a courtesy car in emergency situations where you are not covered
- Picking up your new car which does not have insurance yet from the dealer/garage
Car insurance for short term can be bought from 1 to 28 days. Therefore if you're looking for a weekend car insurance, insurance cover for two weeks only or something similar, you will be able to get the adequate level of cover for any number of days you wish for, provided it does not exceed the 28 days limit though.
Who does these temporary car insurance contracts?
There are a number of insurance companies which provide these short term policies and some of the them are listed below:
- DayInsure
- TempCover
- InsureDaily
- TheAA
- RAC
It is important to note that many people actually think they are insured to drive somebody else's car when in fact they aren't. The misconception is due to the fact that not all comprehensive car insurance policies allow you to drive anyone's car. You need to check with your current insurer first especially if you're a young driver as there are restrictions on who can drive other people's car depending on age and car classification. The one phone call that is required can make a huge difference and it is always better to be safe rather than sorry because if you're caught driving uninsured, you will face severe penalties and so will the person who lent you their car. If not for your own sake, then do it for the person who was kind enough to let you borrow their car.
Sometimes people think they can get away with no insurance since it's going to be an occasional driving. It doesn't matter even if it's just for one day because you are likely to get upto 8 penalty points on your licence plus a maximum fine of £5000 if you're stopped by the police. Why go through all this trouble when the daily rate for short term car insurance is only around £15! It's not a significant amount of money and you should therefore not even think about taking the risk. Try getting a quote and see for yourself now!
5 Replies
New driver short term insurance
We'd like to find occasional insurance to enable our son to use our car for odd days here and there. He lives in Cambridge, we in Lancaster, so most of the time we can't give him chance to keep his hand in with driving but we'd like to take out short-term insurance for his use of our car when possible. He doesn't have a car and won't have for the foreseeable future. He's 24 - 25 in October - and passed his test only in August. Companies I've looked at on the web insist on 12 months full license minimum before they'll give such cover. Any suggestions, please?
[Migrated from previous topic 10189 dated 23 Aug 2008]
Barbara,
It's a good thought to give your son the opportunity to keep up with his driving, otherwise he might get a bit rusty and practice always lead to better drivers. Have you tried eCar Short Term Insurance? They offer temporary insurance policies for drivers aged 25-75. You can check online whether they are going to insure your son when he turns 25 in October. If they turn him down because he hasn't held his licence for at least a year, let me know and I'll try to find an alternative option for you.
[Migrated from previous post 55 dated 30 Sep 2008]
Short term insurance for new drivers
Hey,
I am a British citizen and have held a full driving license for only 2 months since passing my test. I want to drive my brother's car this weekend but struggling to find any insurers who will give me quote unless I have held a license for a minimum of 12 months. Any alternatives out there?
Thanks in advance
[Migrated from previous topic 12562 dated 23 Oct 2013]
You don't have much choice there. The insurers want to see a good driving record for at least 1 full year before they provide short term car insurance.
If you had an insurance policy of your own, you might have been able to drive your brother's car on third party but you don't have that, do you?
[Migrated from previous post 2143 dated 23 Oct 2013]
I bought a 4x4 Mitsubishi Shogun 2002 to ship abroad but need to take it to a tyre shop and in order to do that I need to tax it but without insurance it's impoosible to tax it. Do you do such temporary insurances where I can print off the documents from the email you send me? thank you!
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