Insurance - The eu ruling

Theanswers

http://www.thejournal.ie/insurance-premiums-could-rise-over-european-gender-ruling-2011-02/

What do people generally think of this?

I think it's great.
About time.

I've never crashed, have zero penality points yet pay far FAR more for my insurance.

This is discrimnation.

Cookie_Monster

Insurance will just rise for the cheaper gender. So for car insurance women insurance will rise to men's level rather than men's falling to women's levels or a 50:50 split. More profit for the insurance co's is all that will happen IMO

Tefral

Insurance companies are all about profit nothing else, all they will do is rise womens insurance premiums to match our own.

Theanswers

We could cross our fingers and hope the lower it?

I just think insurance should be based on YOUR proven track record. Not your Sex

cadaliac

As cookie says, the Ins companys will just get richer. There is no way our policy premiums will decrease.
Women will just end up paying more.
The other way to look at this is that we will all loose out - in the case that we have named drivers (wife, GF, whoever) on our policys, which means we will all just end up paying more.
So, no not really good news for anyone really.

challengemaster

cronin_j wrote: »

Insurance companies are all about profit nothing else, all they will do is rise womens insurance premiums to match our own.

Either way, it's still about time it was done. Complete and utter nonsense discrimination, so I'm not bothered if they rise womens premiums to match our own ones. They've gotten away with this crap for far too long anyway.

Last time I checked, there was about €600+ in difference on insuring my car (1.4 almera) in my name/girlfriends name (just wanted to see the difference, wasn't actually going to insure it illegally)

Differences were:
Me: Full license, 2 yr NCB, male
Her: learner permit, 0 NCB, female

How it made sense that someone who'd passed their test and had 2 years NCB at 19 was more dangerous on the roads than a learner with 0 experience is beyond me.

Gophur

cronin_j wrote: »

Insurance companies are all about profit nothing else, .........

And what else would they be about? Charity? Public Service?

Joe 90

challengemaster wrote: »

Either way, it's still about time it was done. Complete and utter nonsense discrimination, so I'm not bothered if they rise womens premiums to match our own ones. They've gotten away with this crap for far too long anyway.

Last time I checked, there was about €600+ in difference on insuring my car (1.4 almera) in my name/girlfriends name (just wanted to see the difference, wasn't actually going to insure it illegally)

Differences were:
Me: Full license, 2 yr NCB, male
Her: learner permit, 0 NCB, female

How it made sense that someone who'd passed their test and had 2 years NCB at 19 was more dangerous on the roads than a learner with 0 experience is beyond me.

How it made sense that someone who'd passed their test and had 2 years NCB at 19 was more dangerous on the roads than a learner with 0 experience may be true as the learner should be accompanied by an experienced driver or instructor whereas the 19 year old knows that he is immortal.:)

Theanswers

Gophur wrote: »

And what else would they be about? Charity? Public Service?

Fairly pricing customers.
Giving people a quote based on there experience not just what some fella did miles down the road.

Remenber there are much more male drivers out there. They are going to have more accident in which the driver was male.

When this is taken into account. the accident rates are almost identical. Them or the RSA dont want to hear this.

Again, About time!

smellslikeshoes

This should have happened a long time ago to be honest, if it was something that favoured men over women all hell would have broken loose.

The only thing I'd be concerned about is how enforceable would it be?

Atomic Pineapple

Agreed its bad news for all except the insurance companies who will be able to raise female insurance rates without anyone able to do anything about it.

There's no getting away from the fact that men and women are different and each present different risks, saying that rates being cheaper for one gender or the other is sexist is total BS in my opinion and highlights how stupid we've become as a species that it can be seen as being sexist.

Matt Simis

draffodx wrote: »

Agreed its bad news for all except the insurance companies who will be able to raise female insurance rates without anyone able to do anything about it.

There's no getting away from the fact that men and women are different and each present different risks, saying that rates being cheaper for one gender or the other is sexist is total BS in my opinion and highlights how stupid we've become as a species that it can be seen as being sexist.

Agreed!
The only people that have any sort of "benefit" from this is those without female partners and even then, they only get a fuzzy feeling of equality, their premium will of course not go down.

a) This will impact couples and households negatively
b) Forced "equality" is not equality, no more than positive discrimination or affirmative action.

Everybody is equal now, just dont measure it.

Shane732

To be honest I think this is great news. I couldn't care less whether it's a case of a man's car insurance dropping or females insurance rising - at least under this ruling I should be treated the same way as everyone in my age bracket irregardless of sex.

In fact I'd nearly prefer women's car insurance to rise; at least that way they'll feel the pain that every young male driver as had to go through.

smellslikeshoes

draffodx wrote: »

Agreed its bad news for all except the insurance companies who will be able to raise female insurance rates without anyone able to do anything about it.

I'm not convinced. Sure in the short term Ins companies will just bring the premiums for female drivers up to the male driver's level. But competition in the Insurance sector has never been so good, the extra profit margin will make opportunities for companies to gain a greater market share by being able to undercut their rivals. It might take a year or two for things to settle down but in my opinion prices will settle to somewhere in the middle between the current male and female prices.

Shane732

Matt Simis wrote: »

Agreed!
The only people that have any sort of "benefit" from this is those without female partners and even then, they only get a fuzzy feeling of equality, their premium will of course not go down.

a) This will impact couples and households negatively
b) Forced "equality" is not equality, no more than positive discrimination or affirmative action.

Everybody is equal now, just dont measure it.

Sorry, what? Everybody is equal, just don't measure it.... My ar*e!!!

cantdecide

The purpouse of insurance is shared liability. You insure your car as a way of spreading the cost of your average claims over a period of time. Forget you vs your peers for a second. Take yourself as an individual over your life.
Paying the majority of your motor insurance when you are at a particular stage of your life kind of defeats the whole purpouse, doesn't it.

It's like front-loading. Doesn't that defeat the purpouse? I think they can adjust policies based on the car's value, area you live, level of cover etc, but I always believed that the core of the policy - covering against accidental damage - should be shared among every motorist, without discrimination against age, sex or even experience in the same way that they can't discriminate against race or creed.

I think that that is the only way of levelling the plaing field which is the object of the exercise afterall.

cadaliac

Shane732 wrote: »

To be honest I think this is great news. I couldn't care less whether it's a case of a man's car insurance dropping or females insurance rising - at least under this ruling I should be treated the same way as everyone in my age bracket irregardless of sex.

In fact I'd nearly prefer women's car insurance to rise; at least that way they'll feel the pain that every young male driver as had to go through.

I doubt that my friend!:D
Anyway, remember - your insurance will not go down. It will increase. How is that good news? For anyone?

Matt Simis

Shane732 wrote: »

Sorry, what? Everybody is equal, just don't measure it.... My ar*e!!!

Satanta

smellslikeshoes wrote: »

I'm not convinced. Sure in the short term Ins companies will just bring the premiums for female drivers up to the male driver's level. But competition in the Insurance sector has never been so good, the extra profit margin will make opportunities for companies to gain a greater market by being able to undercut their rivals. It might take a year or two for things to settle down but in my opinion prices will settle to somewhere in the middle between the current male and female prices.

I agree with this. However I also agree that the amount of insurance you pay should be based on the risk of a payout being necessary. While we can all argue that "I have never crashed", or "I know loads of women that have been involved in a crash". Both of which are true for me BTW, but I also know loads of males that have been in crashes too. I did a quick search and found this document:

http://www.sirc.org/publik/driving.pdf

I quickly read it an it seems studied show that overall young male drivers are the higher risk, and males in general. so if they are at less risk, why should they pay more?

enfant terrible

draffodx wrote: »

Agreed its bad news for all except the insurance companies who will be able to raise female insurance rates without anyone able to do anything about it.

There's no getting away from the fact that men and women are different and each present different risks, saying that rates being cheaper for one gender or the other is sexist is total BS in my opinion and highlights how stupid we've become as a species that it can be seen as being sexist.

Agreed except if it was the other way around and women were being charged more than men it would be seen as sexist and would have been changed long ago.

stevenmu

Satanta wrote: »

I quickly read it an it seems studied show that overall young male drivers are the higher risk, and males in general. so if they are at less risk, why should they pay more?

Because it's considered unnaceptable to use gender as a metric for analysing these kind of statistics. Imagine for a moment if it was the other way around and women paid higher insurance, there's no way it would have lasted that long. Also consider what would happen if they used race as a metric and black people paid more, or if they used able-bodyness and disabled people paid more.

IMO this could be excellent for road safety. Instead of using gender as a metric insurance companies will now be forced to give more wighting to metrics which are much more relevant to safety, such as claims history, penalty points, qualifications (advanced training courses, possibly even number of ordinary lessons done) etc...

This is much more likely to encourage good behaviour by people wanting to have low premiums.

smellslikeshoes

Satanta wrote: »

I agree with this. However I also agree that the amount of insurance you pay should be based on the risk of a payout being necessary. While we can all argue that "I have never crashed", or "I know loads of women that have been involved in a crash". Both of which are true for me BTW, but I also know loads of males that have been in crashes too. I did a quick search and found this document:

http://www.sirc.org/publik/driving.pdf

I quickly read it an it seems studied show that overall young male drivers are the higher risk, and males in general. so if they are at less risk, why should they pay more?

Because someone shouldn't be made pay more based on the way they were born. Using the same logic of making males pay more for insurance, if a study found black people or asian people were involved in more accidents than white people would it be right making them pay more also?

PaulKK

Not to mention that on average more men drive and more men drive more miles than women.

Matt Simis

smellslikeshoes wrote: »

Because someone shouldn't be made pay more based on the way they were born. Using the same logic of making males pay more for insurance, if a study found black people or asian people were involved in more accidents than white people would it be right making them pay more also?

While as I posted Im against this change for practical reasons, if you were to specifically ask me the above question and with acceptable accuracy could confirm that:

Men of X age
People of Race X
People with blue eyes etc
Woman of Y age
etc

Were a higher risk factor, then yes, absolutely it would be "right" they should be paying more, if insurance is based on personal risk an individual represents to an insurance company. Otherwise (as we presumably do to varying degrees) the safest drivers are paying the insurance for the unsafe ones purely due to political correctness.

Taking PC and emotions aside, we are not all dealt the same card at birth, we arent clones. Of course our lives will take different directions, to say someone shouldnt be treated differently (note "different" can have negative and positive connotations) than another would be an unenforceable and illogical argument as they will be, both overtly and covertly by other people and the world itself.


Anyone see the movie 2081 or the read the book?

Based on the short story Harrison Bergeron by celebrated author Kurt Vonnegut, 2081 depicts a dystopian future in which, thanks to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendment to the Constitution and the unceasing vigilance of the United States Handicapper General, everyone is finally equal... The strong wear weights, the beautiful wear masks and the intelligent wear earpieces that fire off loud noises to keep them from taking unfair advantage of their brains. It is a poetic tale of triumph and tragedy about a broken family, a brutal government, and an act of defiance that changes everything.[3]

stevenmu

Anyone see the movie 2081 or the read the book?

Actually that describes nicely what happens when you group people according to gender. You take a safe young male driver and a dangerous young male driver and you punish them both equally for being young and male, rather than punishing one for being dangerous and rewarding the other for being safe. Equally, you take a safe middle aged woman and a dangerous middle aged woman and reward them both for not having a penis without taking into account how safe or dangerous they may be.

Matt Simis

stevenmu wrote: »

Actually that describes nicely what happens when you group people according to gender. You take a safe young male driver and a dangerous young male driver and you punish them both equally for being young and male, rather than punishing one for being dangerous and rewarding the other for being safe. Equally, you take a safe middle aged woman and a dangerous middle aged woman and reward them both for not having a penis without taking into account how safe or dangerous they may be.

While I dont disagree your examples highlight the the problem but also the nature of "consensus" based products, thats infact not at all the point of 2081. The idea people cannot or even "should not" be treated according to how they were born is the absurdity it highlights.

Insurance and how its rolled out is full of issues, both PC (men being victimised) and data based (premiums and profits far higher than needed, men of all ages being loaded due to a very small age window with poor statistics in their gender pool, no provision for mileage high and low, no real provision for maintenance etc etc).

I support any reform to Insurance thats based on more accurate data and profiling, but not based on the simple premise that its somehow morally wrong to profile certain people, places or vehicles in this case. Thats what insurance is, a gamble (for the Insurer).

Satanta

stevenmu wrote: »

Actually that describes nicely what happens when you group people according to gender. You take a safe young male driver and a dangerous young male driver and you punish them both equally for being young and male, rather than punishing one for being dangerous and rewarding the other for being safe. Equally, you take a safe middle aged woman and a dangerous middle aged woman and reward them both for not having a penis without taking into account how safe or dangerous they may be.

How would you tell who is a safe driver and who isn't short of monitoring individual driver behavior? I know we can look at number of previous claims etc, which is how your premium reduces over time. But for the young drivers, they have no previous record of how safe they are or are not. All the companies have to go on is the statistics that show that young males are X times more likely to be involved in a crash. I am not saying it's right, but there would need to be a measurable and reliable metric which could be applied to each individual when calculating risk. What would that be? As far as taking extra lessons and advanced driver training, is there any evidence that they improve the drivers behavior when they are let loose on the roads on their own?

Shane732

Matt Simis wrote: »

ScouseMouse

This is well overdue. Of course a young male is higher risk than a young female, but the system needs a better way of assessing risk.

I have the NCT on friday and put some stp emissions additive into my tank as a precaution as I filled up.

A lady friend in her fourtys asked if it was brake fluid!

This particular lady is lethal behind the wheel but she has lower insurance than me.

This change needs to take effect soon.

Cookie_Monster

superscouse wrote: »

Of course a young male is higher risk than a young female,

stereotype much?

The whole problem with insurance is that it simply discriminates against everyone by putting them all in particular boxes. If the majority of young men drive to fast and cause more crashes then obviously you will too if you happen to be a young man :rolleyes:

imitation

I think this is bad news all around. While im all for a fairer society between the sexes, and it does seem questionable at first why some groups in society have to pay less insurance, when you look at it from the other side it begins to make sense.

Insurance companys have to operate at some kind of profit to function, and they could just operate on the basis that everybody pays the same (and who wants to subsidise the bad drivers out there). The other option is to base it off the statistics, which isn't perfect but its a fairer system in my eyes, it sucks when your younger to have to pay such obscene rates, but on the other hand at least your not paying the same amount for the rest of your life.

Anyway, anything that moves towards averaging the cost across everybody is a bad move in my books.