‘Insurance sector hit’

“If you are a driver with a good claims history, you can negotiate significant discounts/no claim bonus benefits on the standard premium. Your insurance broker will assist you in obtaining quotations from different insurers.”

J. Retnakumar, CEO Insurance Services Centre, said: “More people may be opting for third party insurance due to the economic conditions to save upfront costs but it may prove to be bad as they will have to pay for own damage if anything goes wrong.”

Insurance agents say that the current economic slowdown has hit the insurance sector in Oman.“Not many people are buying new vehicles.

Earlier, the growth of the motor industry on a yearly basis was in double digit numbers, but now it has reduced to a single digit numbers.If there are no new vehicles coming in, the growth of the vehicle insurance is also affected,” he added.

New commercial and private vehicles registered in the Sultanate witnessed a significant drop in 2017.

While the number of private vehicles dropped by 19.9 percent, number of new commercial vehicles registered in the Sultanate witnessed a drop of 34.8 percent till the end of September 2017, according to data from National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).According to NCSI, only 45,498 new private vehicles were registered during the period from January to September 2017 against 56,782 during the corresponding period last year.

For commercial vehicles only 10,234 new vehicles were registered during the period from January to September 2017 against 15,693 in the first nine months of 2016.

The car rental market is however, growing at more than 20 percent.