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EV insurance policies can be up to a third more expensive than ICE equivalents. Jack Carfrae asks why.


“I


would say that insurance policies have gone up about 30% over the last few years, and if you’ve got a high proportion of EVs, you’ve got another 30% premium


on there,” says AFP chair, Paul Hollick. “Pre-Covid… average accident costs would probably be about £1,200 and the average VOR [vehicle-off-road time] would probably be about eight or nine days. Since Covid, you could pretty much double those for ICE vehicles and EVs are probably at least 30 days.”


The cost of electric car insurance is no secret, and arguably among operators’ biggest hurdles as fleets continue to prop up the UK EV market. Hefty premiums have led many to self-insure –


28 | September/October 2024 | www.businesscar.co.uk “The cultures of the


traditional insurers are that they don’t like change –


they’ve never liked change. and even when there is change, they only fi nd comfort if they’ve got historic data.”


covering vehicles on a third-party-only basis and handling repairs themselves – or to increase their policy excess.


In its 2023 report ‘Impact of BEV Adoption on the Repair and Insurance Sectors’, safety body Thatcham (which we approached for comment, but it did not respond) said BEV claims were 25.5% more expensive than those of ICEs and repairs took 14% longer. Many in the industry agree that insurers are generally quicker to write- off EVs than ICEs, too.


It is easy to point the finger at insurers and, ultimately, they do set the premiums. But like anything – particularly EVs, which are misinformation magnets – there is more to this


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