Why Would You Need Temporary Car Insurance And How Can You Get It?

For many people, temporary car insurance may never be required. However, there are occasions when it is a legal requirement for the driver. A good example when this can occur is when you are waiting for delivery of a brand new car. You may have arranged delivery of your new vehicle on the date your current car insurance policy runs out.

A significant problem arises, though, if the delivery of your new vehicle is delayed for a few days or weeks. This means that while you still have your old vehicle, it is no longer insured. Therefore, you require temporary car insurance to drive the car legally on the road until you finally receive your new vehicle.

Another situation when temporary car insurance is required is for a driver who does not own a car and does not have existing cover, but who requires a hire vehicle for a set period such as a holiday, or visiting friends and family.

In the past, motorists in situations such as these who have sought short-term car insurance have often been in the invidious position of having to accept the deal offered by their broker, regardless of whether the quote provided by the company was cheap or not.

Other ways to get short term car insurance was to take out an annual policy for the car and then cancel the policy after a few days or weeks when it was no longer required. Unfortunately, this method often meant motorists were being forced into paying additional penalties for cancelling their cover, or were forced to wait until the insurance company reimbursed them with their cash following their policy being cancelled. For many unscrupulous car companies, this became a simple way to make money from the motorist seeking temporary cover.

Thankfully, now in the UK, there are some high quality car insurance comparison websites available. These sites allow you to compare the prices of full car insurance, but many of the top quality comparison sites also compare different companies’ quotes on a whole host of other products, and it is worth checking if that includes temporary car insurance.

The upshot of this is that you can now find the deal with the best discount possible, when seeking temporary car insurance as well as you can when looking for annual car insurance.

If a website does not expressly state that it offers temporary car insurance, then it is worthwhile seeking an annual quote for your vehicle and status anyway. You can then use the results to gauge which companies are likely to offer you a better deal on your temporary insurance given your particular situation and requirements. It is certainly a far more efficient way to find this form of insurance than ringing around a large number of brokers.

Temporary car insurance is still a niche market somewhat and can be open to abuse by less scrupulous insurance companies. That said – you still have every right to shop around to ensure you obtain the best possible deal on the insurance you need.