Are you guesstimating your mileage when you renew your car insurance?
Over a quarter of UK, drivers could be overpaying or invalidating their insurance cover.
According to research carried out by USwitch:
- 27% of motorists guess how far they drive every year
- Only 22% actually checked their MOT certificates
- Drivers overestimate journey distances by 15%
When you’re going through the arduous annual slog of car insurance renewal, do you have a wild stab in the dark at your annual mileage or is every rotation of your milometer monitored with acute precision?
More than a quarter of the respondents surveyed said that they had simply guessed the figure which could lead to real issues as:
- they could end up paying too much for insurance, or
- if they exceed their stated mileage it could invalidate their insurance
According to the RAC, the UK average mileage is around 8000, and UK drivers overestimate driving distances by 15%.
The research suggests that many driver’s perceptions of distances were highly inaccurate, as detailed in the table below.
| Journey | Average estimated distance (miles) | Actual distance | Difference | (%) |
| Manchester – Sheffield | 110 | 39 | 71 | 182% |
| Manchester – Liverpool | 94 | 35 | 59 | 169% |
| Cardiff – Bristol | 116 | 45 | 71 | 158% |
| Manchester – Leeds | 105 | 45 | 60 | 133% |
| Manchester – Nottingham | 132 | 73 | 59 | 81% |
| Manchester – Birmingham | 125 | 86 | 39 | 45% |
| London – Leeds | 172 | 127 | 45 | 35% |
| London – Manchester | 202 | 151 | 51 | 34% |
| London – Liverpool | 157 | 118 | 39 | 33% |
| London – Birmingham | 154 | 118 | 36 | 31% |
The most accurate way of calculating your annual mileage is to use your previous years’ MOT certificate as a reliable reference point.
If you want to keep accurate records of your fleet activity and supply your drivers with in-depth performance insights, we provide a Telematics Solution that gets the best of your drivers and your grey fleet. We also provide a range of fuel cards that enable your fleet to go further for less.
Find out more at www.cambriancards.com/telematics/ or call us free on 0800 612 6132
