There are many things in British life that are pretty much guaranteed. It’ll rain a lot during Glastonbury, England will fail far more in the world cup than most expect and insurance prices will always rise. However that last point doesn’t seem to hold true as in-fact, insurance prices have been dropping on average since 2011 and most recently, they’ve dipped another 15 per cent.
The average car insurance price today, is £579, compared with £678 a year ago. That figure is further reduced from the insurance industry’s peak back in 2011, where the average quote reached a whopping £858.
Of course premiums haven’t fallen across the board though, with some age groups getting bigger discounts than others. Clearly young women are doing something to improve their lot, as females aged 17-20 saw the biggest drop of the lot: a 33 per cent year on year fall on premium pricing. This, the Guardian points out, is somewhat surprising, considering it was expected that with the EU gender directive, which forced insurers not to stigmatise one gender of drivers over the other, despite figures showing a disparity in certain aspects of driving between the two, that premiums for young women would rise. In-fact, it seems to just have brought male premiums down to the same level.
Some typically high interest areas, like Manchester and Merseyside have also seen reductions, with a 19 per cent dip in premiums across both areas. The local average is still one of the highest in the country, at £808, but that’s certainly a lot better than it was a year ago, when it was just shy of £1,000 on average.
The source for these figures is Confused.com, which said it saw premiums drop for men, as well as women in most regions. The AA agreed with it, citing from its own research that premiums had fallen by £100.
However, not everyone is so positive about the future. Buzz killer James Rakow, from Deloitte, said that the coming year could see prices return to previously high levels.
“The trend is likely to reverse as insurers made modest underwriting profits last year. They paid out £99 in claims and expenses for every £100 of premiums in 2013,” he said.
“After nearly two years of falling prices, I expect car insurance premiums to start rising in line with inflation over the next 12 months. The UK personal motor insurance industry returned to underwriting profitability in 2013 and reported some of the best figures since 2004. However, these figures were supported by the fact that insurers felt able to release claims reserves held at the previous year-end and this trend cannot go on indefinitely.”
What about you guys though? Did you notice much of a dip in your car insurance this year? My renewal isn’t up yet, so I have to wait and see.
