123 Go Drive App for reduced insurance renewal

Speaking as a developer, the Accelerometer and GPS in the average smartphone is just not up to the task of this. It's fine for games etc but not for monitoring driving. It doesn't take into account the orientation of the phone, how its mounted etc etc. Would be fairly easy to cheat if you placed it in a gyroscope In the code itself, you would want to be fairly savvy with your filters and smoothing to ensure you are getting sensible readings, and I very much doubt they are doing this. By comparison, the trackers we use take about a week to get the calibration just right, and we have to configure a shedload of parameters. The result however is spot on in comparison to a phone.

Personally I don't like the idea of being monitored while I drive. Way too much data for insurance companies to use and its not going to be positive for anyone. 5% of my premium is less than €50, I'd spend that if I had a heavy right foot week on petrol. It's not enough for me to part with that data.

After 30 years of accident-free driving and still getting quotes in excess of €900 per year from these twats, they can stick their app up their rusty bullet hole.

Been using the drivesafe from AXA the past year. It's an absolute lifesaver for any first time drivers. For me it had nothing to do with getting money back, and more to do with the original cost. Got my first car last year, and being 23, the cheapest place I got quoted for insurance was about 1,900 quid. Axa quoted me 1,100 if I used the app. Like the above, if I get over 70% then my 5% of my premium gets given back to me. Checked every quarter so potential to get a hundred or so quid back which is handy.

It has absolutely very little impact on your battery as well, so no idea why someone said that above. Not that I've noticed anyway, not much more than any other app would. Don't even feel myself using it these days, it's more so a habit now when I get into the car.

Not sure I'd take it if I was just offered it in order to be able to get some of my premium back however, as I said, it was more about the relative cost of the policy compared to elsewhere.

DMcL1971 wrote: »

Accelerating hard is necessary in order to safely merge from a minor slip road on to a fast moving motorway. Braking hard is often necessary when exiting a motorway. Driving along a road with speed bumps involves constantly speeding up and slowing down. If the analysis program doesn't know about the speed bumps it would think you were driving like a nutcase.

I definitely agree in terms of it not being completely accurate. But it has never scored me overly bad I don't think. However the bit I've quoted is not entirely through to be fair. Why would you constantly speed up and slow down in a road with speed bumps? Why not just travel at a speed comfortable enough to get over all the bumps? And why you need to brake hard when exiting a motorway? You know your exit and should be prepared to come off. In regards to breaking harsh on the M50, I do agree, but then again most who do are people who call the outside lane the "fast lane". It's not.

jimgoose wrote: »

Correct. There are many HQDNs - the South Ring in Cork being one - that are not officially motorways for this reason, among others. Some of the slip-roads are way too short, and many cars are not able to reach a safe merging speed on them.

Another factor is cars currently travelling on the motorway who feel it necessary to speed up when they see car coming from a slip road!

Their app is woegus. Installed it for a the craic for a couple of weeks as the mrs was also using it just to see if i could beat her. Without trying i got in the 90s on my third go. Then other times despite my most nunlike acceleration and braking it scored me down for 'smooth driving'.

Ive come to the conclusion that this app encourages unsafe tortoise like driving and i hated myself as a driver for the week i had it. It leads to frustrated drivers behind you and unsafe situations where you cannot accelerate to merge on roads and motorways.

Still scored 80% for the two weeks mind you. But i hated every minute of it.

Speaking purely as a driver, I'd be SERIOUSLY reluctant to agive any insurance company this kind of information. I can recall back in the 90's, finding out that motor insurance companies have huge power in this country due to the compulsory nature of road insurance, and I can remember being unable to get any insurance cover at all in my 20's, and the basis for this was absolutely nothing other than my age. I eventually managed to get insurance which was hugely overpriced and went on to have 20 years of safe and event free driving since then.

Giving insurance companies any basis whatsoever for increasing what they perceive to be the level of risk that you might represent, I think is nothing less than seriously unwise. We have 2 authorities in this country whose job it is to assess and manage driving behaviour:

(1) The driver testing system which evaluates your ability to drive safely and issues you a permit if you demonstrate a capability to drive in a safe and proficient manner.

(2) Gardai, who are tasked with the job of enforcing the provisions of the Road Traffic Act(s).

Insurance companies have no mandate whatsoever to enforce road traffic legislation in this jurisdiction, and where the systems they are using are questionable at best in terms of their design and functionality, and the purpose that the data is then being used for is anything but clear, not on my life would I give an insurance company access to any of this information.

Who is to say that if the app tells them that you are regularly driving at a particular time after midnight during the weekend, that they are not categorising you on that basis as a drink driver or as someone who through no fault of your own, is at a higher risk of a crash because you may be driving at a time when other drunk drivers are more likely to be on the road?

Who is to say that in the event of a claim, that the first thing your insurance company may do is pull up the data coming from your app and suddenly this data, which could be unreliable, becomes the basis for you being held to have caused an accident and your no claims bonus goes out the window and your policy goes up to an insane price, meanwhile no other insurance company will touch you?!?

If the other driver doesn't have real time data streaming to his/her insurance company via their smartphone, in theory you could be held to have caused an accident even though there is absolutely no telemetry data available in relation to the other driver? If the data itself is unreliable, or at least has not been properly verified and tested by an independent third party that can be trusted, that is completely separate from the insurance company using the data, and if it is not possible to verify exactly what the data is being used for, (and let us not forget that these are Irish insurance companies we are talking about here!!!), who is to say what unsavory situation you could end up being placed in by your insurance company here, at no fault of your own?

There are also serious data privacy concerns here, if you sign up to an app like this, your insurance company basically have a real time tracking device on you. Who is that information being shared with? We have recently seen how government intelligence agencies in the US and also in the UK have been deeply tied into the data systems of multinational corporations.

I would just ask anyone who may be thinking of being bribed into using an app like this by an insurance company to take a big step back and ask themselves why insurance companies are now trying to make it appear like normal business, to have real time tracking devices on its customers? Why do they now want what is a HUGE amount of real time private telemetry data, on it's customers? Who is overseeing how and when this data is being used? I can recall a few years that there was certainly no state watchdog telling insurance companies in this jurisdiction that they had to quote tens of thousands of Irish motorists in their 20's for cover, these companies could and were giving the two fingers to tens of thousands of safe young drivers for many years by refusing to even give them a quote and were a law onto themselves and appear to still be a law onto themselves due to a lack of effective regulation in this whole area, despite there being a financial regulator governing the insurance sector and an insurance ombudsman who deals specifically with complaints concerning insurance.

ironclaw wrote: »

@GARAGE.IE, good points but FYI if you own a Apple or Android device, you're data is being shared already to map traffic patterns etc. Its how Google Maps gets its info.

I hear ya, if you have a smartphone these days you are essentially being tracked in real time. The thing is though, Apple or Google might have data on your movements but Apple or Google aren't insuring your driving and can't put a financial gun to your head by ramping up your policy very significantly, in the event they they might take a look at the data coming from your app in the event of an incident, and form a view that you were the cause of a crash. Having seen how insurance companies have conducted themselves in this country in recent years, (we have a 2% levy on all non life insurance products in this country to clean up the mess from Quinn Direct), I wouldn't trust them an inch with the usage of this information.

This is a trial. At the end of the month app should be uninstalled and all data will become anonymous.

Those who take part in the trial will receive discount even if they score 20 (5%).

No need to be paranoid about it as it is voluntary.

You can mark journey as passenger, too and it won't count towards your overall score.

dr.fuzzenstein wrote: »

And if I ever have an app/black box forced on me, there will be a series of unfortunate, unexplainable and unfixable technical "issues" that will prevent that sh*t from ever working.

Eh... Get yourself a proper phone and you will never have to worry about the technical issues...

GARAGE.IE wrote: »

How people do not have major privacy concerns about this kind of stuff, really amazes me. It starts off with, "this is just a little trial" or "we'll give you a 5% discount on a really high premium if you run with this for us", within a few years every metre you previously have been driving has been recorded and a set of arguments will inevitably be built around the device and the information coming from the device, to increase your cost of insurance.

I had a similar conversation with someone recently in relation to having to register your car with a parking company in a private estate. There was an expectation that I had to get on my phone and tell some third party business, where I am and for how long I intend to stay there. This kind of subtle yet serious invasion of privacy has just crept into all our lives in recent years. Some might read what I'm saying here and say I'm being paranoid or whatever, I just completely disagree with the mission creep in recent years where in relation to what used to be just ordinary day to day living, you are now expected to be recorded or filmed or to have to submit yourself to being electronically monitored in relation to daily stuff that you do. In the case of smartphone technology, we consent to it, but in the case of motor insurance, I won't be having any of it, not after 20 years of seeing how motor insurance companies in this jurisdiction conduct themselves.

Whilst I agree there is a fair bit of data handover it's nothing more than any other device in your life. Have you a tesco clubcard? You'd be amazed at the privacy details stored on that & similar with most retail loyalty schemes & apps.