Dziennik Ubezpieczeniowy, 12.05.2008

Uninsured problem

In her presentation during the 2nd International Motor Insurance Forum organized by the Pro Motor Association, Caroline Maion, legal and technical manager at the Council of Bureaux said that in 2003 the Council approached the problem of uninsured drivers and determined the average number of uninsured drivers in the EEA at 3%.

In 2007, a poll was carried out in 12 countries where the uninsured rate was lower than 2% (e.g. Austria, Finland, and Luxemburg). Based on the answers, 6 best practices as follows were prepared allowing reduction of the scale of the problem:

• education of the public,
• ensuring that insurance is bought before car registration,
• automatic renewal of policy,
• windscreen stickers with insurance expiry date,
• claims-history-dependent system making it difficult for some drivers to get an insurance offer. Belgium and Spain have set up bureaux where such drivers are offered MTPL policies (under certain conditions). In France such drivers are insured by the guarantee fund.
• penal sanctions.

(…) Elżbieta Turkowska-Tyrluk, , chairwoman of the Insurance Guarantee Fund UFG in her presentation on the Polish market reported that in fleet insurance one policy may cover more than one vehicle. In turn, with approx. 18 million registered cars there are 15.6 million active policies in Poland. Owing to this fact other calculations are used. The Fund compares the value of claims it pays against the total value of claims paid by the entire market. According to this method, UFG reports 0.96% of uninsured vehicle owners in Poland in 2007.

Matts Nordell,legal director in the Swedish Motor Insurers Bureau reported that in Sweden the uninsured rate amounts to 0.93% of registered vehicles. (…). Fines of 10.7 euro per day are among methods used to encourage drivers to take out compulsory insurance.

Frank Lewis,secretary general of the French Guarantee Fund said that in 2006 there were approx. 2.2% uninsured drivers in France involved in accidents resulting in personal losses. He indicated that a majority of uninsured drivers are people with low income or young drivers. The older the age group is, the fewer uninsured drivers there are.