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A couple of months ago while having supper at my brother's, chatting with my nephew, he was telling me that he had got an insurance quote for a 1.4 Fiesta of £8k!. Now granted this was without a 'black box', but even so, i was staggered at the amount. A few days late i sent, via my brother, a link to an article on the Admiral insurance website on which cars were cheapest to insure for a new driver.
I should point out that he is not yet 17 (November), but has recently started working as an apprentice engineer/mechanic at a location which, to get to from where he lives, is very akward and difficult without his own transport. Fortunately my brother knew someone who lives reasonably close and works in the same town, but unsurprisingly, my nephew is desperate to get his licence and his own set of wheels as soon as possible.
Fast forward to last Friday and i was out at my brothers house picking up my sister in law and i noticed a (MK1) Skoda Fabia parked behind their Suzuki Swift. I enquired as to who it belonged to and my nephew said it was his. Then went on to say it was a VRS!. So i asked how much the insurance was going to be on that, bearing in mind the ludicrous price he was quoted for a Fiesta, £1100 he says (with the black box). He went on to say that because it was classed as a 'family car' it was considered a lower risk. This sounds very odd to me, given the Fabia is the same size of car as the Fiesta.
I know i have read on the forum before that having a low insurance group is not by itself an indication that the insurance will be cheaper, but i always took these claims with a pinch of salt. The reason being, if the insurance group did not corespond to how much the insurance for the car is going to cost, then what would be the point of insurance groups?.
As it turns out, assuming the Fiesta he got a quote for was a '02-'08 model, it would fall into group 10. The Fabia is group 18.
So how does that work?. I do remember many years ago being on holiday to the Orkney Islands to visit a family friend and he was showing me the Volvo 440 he had got for his son as a first car and despite having quite a big engine, he said it was cheaper to insure because it was considered a low risk car. Presumably bought by a more responsible type!.
But knowing my nephew as i do, i have grave concerns about how long it will be before he either writes the car off, or gets done for speeding. Having such a powerful car, as a first car, i really don't think is a good thing. I am also thinking that as the Fabia has a big heavy lump of a diesel engine up front, it is going to understeer quite a lot if my nephew is over ambitious in his corner entry speed (and there are a lot of winding country roads around here, including in between my nephews home and work). A fact which will only be made worse by the fact that, like my brother, i'm sure any tyres bought for the car will be cheapo's. I will voice my concerns to my brother when i get the chance, but i doubt it will do much good as the car has already been bought.
What are the forum members thoughts on this, both the bizarre cost disparity between the insurance costs, and the choice of such a poweful machine (130bhp and around 230 lb/ft of torque) as a first car?
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