AS FAR AS WE KNOW, it hasn’t arrived in Australia as yet, but overseas, drivers are being encouraged to install tracking devices in their vehicles to be rewarded with reduced insurance premiums. It can only be a matter of time before the system is trialled here.
The device monitors mileage, time of travel, acceleration and braking. And of course, it even knows if you’re travelling above the posted speed limit.
Once the evaluation period is over, the insurance company can assess your risk level and offer you a lower premium of perhaps as much as 25 percent. On the other hand, it is quite conceivable that some drivers would be assessed as high risk and have their premiums increased or even have cover refused. Another concern in Australia would be the notoriously unreliable data – I regularly travel along one stretch of road signposted with a speed limit of 80km/h but almost every sat nav is telling me the limit is 50km/h. Imagine how an insurance company would react to data that showed I regularly exceed the posted speed limit by 30km/h for considerable periods of travel time!
The monitoring device is provided by the insurance company to be plugged into your car’s on-board diagnostics system. Once installed, the company tracks your every move on the road and behind the wheel, including any attempt to disconnect the device.
Data recorded and returned to the company includes:
- Speed limits: Even if you’re simply keeping up with the flow of traffic at 110 km/h, you’re still driving above the speed limit and it will be noted.
- Time of travel: Do you drive a lot at night or during rush hour? Insurance companies reward drivers who use their car when there is a low collision risk, like on weekends.
- Mileage: Insurance premiums are typically lower when you travel fewer than 15,000 kilometres a year. Adding 500 kilometres or so to your weekly commutes will cost you a significant sum at the end of the year.
- Acceleration and braking: You may think you are gentle on brakes and acceleration, but insurance companies define hard braking as “any acceleration of 13 km/h per second or faster and deceleration of 15 km/h per second or faster” and you’d be surprised to see how often you exceed these limits.
It’s an interesting conundrum: are you willing to expose your every driving action to Big Brother in order to reduce the cost of your insurance? Another recorded side effect of having a tracker installed is many drivers actually modify their driving behaviour (as they do when there’s a visible police car in the vicinity).
And then there’s the other possibility. Eventually, insurance companies may decide that having a tracker fitted in your vehicle is a condition of them offering you insurance. Welcome to the future.