Putting ‘black box’ in cars could lower cost of insurance
PUTTING a “black box” into cars could successfully tackle motor insurance fraud and bring down the cost of cover.
Former president of the High Court Nicholas Kearns said the use of so-called telematics has played a huge role in combating fraud in Britain.
Mr Kearns has been appointed by the Government to head up the Personal Injuries Commission, which has been tasked with comparing award levels here with those internationally.
Telematics involves attaching a device, sometimes called a black box, to a car as a way of monitoring the location, movement, status and behaviour of the vehicle.
The device records where it has travelled, how fast it has gone, how fast the brakes were applied, if the horn was used and whether it swerved or not.
Mr Kearns said using such a device would provide “castiron” evidence that an accident happened, or could prove evidence was false. “The use of telematics would lower premiums for careful drivers,” he said.
The devices cost no more than €150, with the technology only being used by AIG and Aviva at the moment, he said.
The retired judge said a telematics device was key to uncovering a recent fraudulent motor insurance claim.
A man and woman involved in a crash claimed not to know each other. But the device in the man’s car showed he had actually visited the woman’s home 50 times in the previous month.
This proved it was a staged crash, Mr Kearns told the Insurance Ireland fraud conference.
AIG offers discounts of up to 20pc on motor cover for using an app that monitors driving.
Mr Kearns told an Insurance Ireland annual fraud conference the use of telematics devices could be restricted to drivers who agree to have them.
He said the technology could be very useful in determining if someone is telling the truth. If the device was destroyed and the evidence on it lost, this would tell its own story to the court, he said.
Where there are two telematics experts for each side, and they disagree on the evidence, Mr Kearns said they could be told to “hot tube” until they agree on the evidence. Hot tubing is legal slang for experts from the same discipline giving evidence at the same time and in each other’s presence.
British drivers who fit a telematics device to their cars save an average of €160 on their policies.