British motorists continue to make more and more insurance claims and this is in turn, now absorbing up to £150 per person of their car insurance premiums.

For those that have not made a claim, this means that they are now subsidising claimants to the tune of £150 every year.

According to the recent studies, it is suggested that the main reason for the increased number of claims is simply fraud.

Factors such as damage caused by drivers who do not have valid insurance isn’t helping and causing some concern.

Up to £66 of this £150 is said to come from claims submitted by drivers claiming to have suffered whiplash injuries following an accident.

The important thing here is to ensure that if you are involved in an accident, fault or non-fault, ensure you document as much as you can remember about the accident and particularly any injuries sustained by you or the other people involved. Take photos, use your mobile if it has capability and most have nowadays.

Whilst accepting that injuries such as whiplash may not manifest themselves immediately, you will have a better indication of things and whether such claims are genuine if you have taken notes etc. that you can refer to later. Remember, if anyone sustains an injury, you are obliged to contact the police before leaving the scene.

Notify your insurer as soon as you can if there are injuries involved and if you suspect some potential fraudulent claim winging its way, tell them.

Swinton Car Insurance have revealed that some drivers are finding themselves having to submit insurance claims because of damage to their vehicles which could have been avoided.

According to their recent research findings, 36% of drivers do not know their vehicle.

Furthermore, 29% of these people did not know one of the most basic tasks; namely how to change a tyre.

Tyre conditions form part of the Road Traffic Act and if you drive around with your tyre treads which are less than the legal minimum, you could face prosecution, endorsements on your licence, and an increase in your next renewal premium.

Of even greater consequence is the risk of your car not stopping and sticking to the road as effectively thereby increasing the chances of you having an accident.

Tyre pressures are equally important, and Swintons research identified that 20% of people questioned didn’t know the correct tyre pressures for their vehicle or indeed, how to check them.

Drivers with a better understanding of their vehicles that regularly conduct routine maintenance checks are less likely to need to make unnecessary claims on their insurance.

If you are a parent, take the trouble to either show your kinsfolk how to undertake the checks or enrol them on a basic car maintenance course at your local school or college.

You will be doing them a big favour and helping them to keep their insurance premiums down.

Insurance companies use people’s occupation as one of their underwriting criterions when calculating an insurance premium.

Did you know that some insurers will view what is pretty much the same job in different ways? Would you consider the job of a reporter to be different to that of a journalist? Some insurers do!

How would you describe your occupation?

Whilst we are not in a position to question the technicalities of such insurance providers underwriting decisions, you can be sure that if they charge journalists higher insurance premiums than those working in a job described as a journalist, then they have, at some time, had their fingers burned and had to pay out more money and probably more often to policyholders that have declared their occupation as a journalist than they have for those declaring their occupation as a reporter.

Therefore, ensure you give as much information as possible about your occupation and you may even realise a saving on your insurance premium.

That is not to say you should lie, you simply need to honest and ensure you describe your job accurately.

There are always several ways to describe the same job but ensure you don’t mislead your insurer otherwise you could find you invalidate your cover.

Play around on those aggregator websites and you will see for yourself.

It’s a common theme and thought at the moment for many people in the current economic climate.

Downgrading to save money on fuel, insurance premiums and road fund licence fees makes sense. Cars are luxuries that few of us can afford to be without nowadays, but luxury they remain.

With this in mind, rather than do away with the car completely many are turning to downgrading their car for smaller, less expensive models, albeit a short term decision for the lovers of the big SUV’s and hot hatches etc. hopefully.

Here are a few that aren’t quite as hot but still offer performance of note that you might like to consider:-

The Mitsubishi Colt Ralliart is a good smaller, hot hatch offering 147bhp from its 1.5 litre engine. With it coming from the same stable as the Evo, there is some real pedigree. It’s quite a lot cheaper than the Golf GTI and Focus ST, lower insurance grouping and turns in 40.9mpg.

The Ford Fiesta Econetic is arguably the best supermini on the road and is now more eco-friendly. It turns in a staggering 76.3mpg enabling you to travel some 755 miles on a tank of fuel. Even greater news is the fact that it is only group 4 rated for insurance and with only 98g/km of CO2, you pay absolutely no road tax.

Driving around in town and needing a small car to park in those oh so tight spaces and you could be a lot worse than the Toyota iQ. It may be small and only around one foot longer than the Smartcar but you can still fit 3 adults in it.

Again, with CO2 emissions of only 99g/km means no road tax to pay.

How long have you had car insurance with the same company?

If the answer is years then you could be paying more than you need to. Start shopping around. There is a wealth of aggregator internet sites offering comparisons between literally hundreds of insurance providers.

Even if you are not IT literate, or have a phobia of computers, don’t simply pick up that phone wasting your time and money by randomly phoning insurance companies.

You really should do some research because without it, you will have no idea how competitive the companies you contact are or whether they are offering the best deal for you.

Yes, many people still prefer to speak to a person rather than do things on-line but you may be doing yourself a dis-service and greatly reduce your chances of getting a really good deal.

If you can’t face doing it yourself, get your kids to do it, they love anything to do with computers and will be more than happy to do it for you. Just give them the information and send them on their way.

Get them to look at the various comparison sites such as confused.com and gocompare.com to see who are going to be among the cheapest companies for YOU. No two individuals are the same so don’t just assume that if your twin brother gets a good quote from one company that they will be best for you. They might be, but you will never know unless you do the comparison. Who is to say that his deal is still the best on the market now? Insurance companies are constantly reviewing their premiums and it may have changed.

Don’t play into your insurance companies hands and just pay your renewal premium.

Shop around, and don’t be afraid to go back to your current insurer and offer them the opportunity to match, or even beat the best quote you have obtained.

Any person involved in a rear shunt is probably going to have suffered some kind of whiplash, even if they did not feel the need to make a claim previously.

Irrespective of whether you did, or did not, make a claim previously, and again, irrespective of whether you were successful or not on that occasion, makes no difference.

You are in fact entitled to make a claim for damages for the personal injury you have suffered from this second accident as the fact that you have had a whiplash injury before does not preclude you from claiming.

You need to be aware however that it may affect the amount of compensation you may receive. It s for this reason that you should always get yourself checked out by your doctor or your local Accident and Emergency Department following an accident where there is suspicion of an injury. It is also a prerequisite that you inform the police of any accident involving personal injury.

Most motor insurers now offer legal protection as an add-on to their policies, so get in touch with your insurer and submit your claim. Failing that, there are many legal advisors offering no win, no fee services.

There will be occasions when, following a car accident, the injured need to be taken to a hospital and undergo medical treatment.

There may also be occasion unfortunately, when that medical treatment provided will not meet the exacting standards expected/demanded, or some of the actions and treatment taken causes other complications.

It is with this in mind that The Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) has launched PEOPLE First offering people injured by negligent parties a free advice service for help.

People First will be guided by an independent consumer panel made up of specialist professionals which includes former chairman of the Health and Safety Commission, Sir Bill Callaghan and Neal Stone of the British Safety Council.

The service will provide information, support and guidance to victims of negligence, through a new resource made up of easily understandable fact sheets and a new website to help victims of negligence when they are at their most vulnerable.

The fact sheets will offer advice on issues such as what to do after an injury at
work or hospital, who to contact after an injury, how to find rehabilitation, who to turn to after an injury and how to navigate your way through the insurance small print.

There have, over the years been many incidents whereby insurers have deemed it more financially prudent to concede a claim and make an out of court agreement to settle a claim that fight the case in court.

High Court Litigation can cost an extortionate amount of money and even insurers think twice before taking such action.

There are however such instances, when priciples are involved, and it is from this angle that some peole are now pushing for a fighting fund to be set up and managed by the Association of British Insurers (ABI) to avoid settling test cases too soon.

The man behind the request, Declan Treanor, chief executive of Garwyn Loss Adjusters has called on insurers to build a “fighting fund” to avoid settling test claim cases prematurely.

Mr Treanor is coming at it from the position of ensuring all companies, irrespective of their size, should have access to money to allow them to challenge any case, particularly where winning a relatively small case, there will be a long-term benefit to the industry.

Mr Treanor also said that at the moment, whilst smaller insurers had less money to take a case to the High Court, the larger companies had sufficient resources to pick their fights.

Anyone involved in an accident and sustained an injury has a set amount of time before which they must commence action against the responsible third party.

As an example, if you were run over on say January 25th 2007 at which time you did not consider your injuries sufficient to warrant submitting a claim against the person that caused the accident but it now turns out that these injuries have now started to cause other problems, you have until January 24th 2010 to commence action through the Motor Insurers Bureau.

Whether pursuing a claim against someone who was insured at the time or not, you would be well advised to seek professional help and advice and appoint a legal representative to pursue the matter on your behalf as such matters can often become complex and technical.

Be in no doubt, there will be a few hoops you will be asked to jump through and a few hurdles to overcome that could manifest themselves due to the time lapsed since the accident requiring professional intervention probably.

Even if you don’t feel injured at the time, or there is nothing hurting, get yourself checked by your GP at the very least as soon after any accident as you can. This will assist any future claim by formally recording any potential medical problem.

It’s drifting towards those summer months and the optimistic people, hoping for a hot, dry summer will soon start to bring out those cabriolet motors or start searching for such a car in preparation for soaking up the sun whilst out on the open road.

It’s the recent all too brief glimpse of the sun that manufacturers and garages are hoping will help boost the sales in new and second hand soft tops, cabriolets and T Bar design motors during the next few months.

Just like other motors however, the ladies are able to secure better insurance premiums than the men.

A 24 year old young lady with 4 years no claims bonus can expect to pay between £334 and £800 for comprehensive cover on a 1600cc, Vauxhall Astra Cabriolet built in 2002.

The poor 24 year old male can expect to pay between £360 up to as much as £1,100 for the same vehicle and cover.

Unfortunately gentlemen, until such time as you can clean up your act and bring the insurance claims costs etc. down to the same level as the female drivers, our lady friends are going to continue enjoying lower insurance premiums.

Realistically, this is unlikely to happen so unfortunately, premiums for men will remain higher than for the ladies for the foreseeable future so we may as well get used to it.