Every week there seems to be a news story about how prices are rising for motorists, whether this is fuel, fees, tax or insurance, and this has now reached the point where many drivers may not be able to afford to drive at all this year.
A survey by comparethemarket.com has found that 1 in 5 drivers have said that they may have to sell their car in 2018 due to not being able to afford the costs associated with running it, which equates to around 7 and a half million drivers in the UK.
The inflated cost of car insurance seems to be one of the most significant issues. The cost of car insurance has hit a record level which is pushing many motorists to the breaking point. It has been rising steadily for a while now, and the average annual premium is £758, which is up £43 year on year, causing 52% of people to say that they may need to give up their car.
55% of drivers are also saying that rising petrol prices and the cost of car repairs are becoming too high for them to afford, with an average of £342 being spent on garage bills in the last 12 months with 1 in 10 paying up to £1000.
Avoid high repair bills
One of the ways that high car repair bills can be avoided is to ensure that you do your research before committing to getting your car fixed somewhere, and get a second opinion before going ahead with any repairs. Recently in the news, there was a story of a girl who was nearly charged over £600 to fix her air conditioning that her car did not even have. When she got a second opinion, the garage discovered it was a different fault, but the risk still ran that she could have been charged for something that she did not have. As 38% of drivers said that they have a knowledge gap about their car which is preventing them from being cost-efficient, it seems that this is one area that many people could improve in.
In fact, 43% of drivers are aware that they are not cost efficient when it comes to their cars for some reasons, but there are a few other ways in which people can stay on top of the things which can impact on the cost of running a car.
Compare and Research
For example, always research and compare car insurance quotes when your premium is up for renewal and don’t automatically accept the quote from your current insurance company as this may not necessarily be your cheapest option. Check for no claims discounts and shop around. Don’t be afraid to barter between two companies to lower your price.
You may also benefit from looking into having a black box installed in your car to bring your insurance premium down, especially if you are a young driver looking to cut costs. Some insurance companies are also offering black boxes for drivers of any age, and it can help to lower your insurance costs and provide money-saving tips.
The main worry that has been stated by Simon McCulloch, Commercial Director at comparethemarket.com is that if the cost of owning a car continues to rise it may put the brakes on car ownership in the UK. In the long run, the rising costs would be bad news for the economy as many people need their car to be able to get around, whether to work or to take the kids out.
How PetrolPrices.com can help
As well as researching garages and insurance quotes when required, you can save money by ensuring that you always fill up your tank with the cheapest fuel available to you, and we can help you with that.
We find and publish the lowest fuel prices in each area of the country with 98% of stations being updated daily, so you know that you are always receiving the most up to date information for your particular location. You can get a price alert for your area via email as well.
In our basic plan, which is free, we have limited searches and limited prices alerts, but for just £2 a month with Plus you can get a route planner to find the cheapest fuel on your route, more searches, better searches and so much more information.
Do you find that the cost of driving has risen up? What’s your biggest concern about the expense of motoring? Let us know.
I live in Cornwall with a lack of public transport the only way of getting anywhere is a car whether it be work ,shopping Hospital treatment or just day to day living .It being one of the lowest paid areas I’m just wondering how folks are going cope !
By a horse
Did you k now that in the early 1900, London City Council was moaning because they were shifting over 100 ton of horse manure off the roads every day of the year? I bet that smell was far worse pollution than any vehicle today.
So in those days the Authorities had to put up with it from the road users – today it’s the road users who have to put with it from the Authorities!
Inconvenient, for sure. But that smell won’t kill you (if we’re only comparing smells).
Horse crap does not smell and is good for your garden, rose beds, and rubaharb.
By not paying for insurance or maintenance
This is only going to get worse as vehicles become more and more reliant on costly technology
Totally agree with your comment Alan. I’ve just had new tyres fitted to my car and the fitters could not re-code 2 of my tyre valves for the tyre inflation system built into the car. I had to go back to the manufacturer where 2 new tyre valves cost me £367. Where have the good old days gone where a tyre valve was only 50p on the invoice. Furthermore, the manufacturer warned me not to let anybody else change the battery, as the whole car electronics will need to be reset, something only they can do because the hardware/software to reprogramme is exclusive to them only.
You must own a BMW Gary?!?
Sorry, wrong guess-It’s a Toyota. Been speaking about this to others and it appears french cars have even dearer tyre valves, It has to be done otherwise it is a MOT failure if system is not functioning 100%.
Get a garage to deactivate it on the ecu, that should work.
Too many fancy gadgets on cars these that are not needed by most they are fitted as gimmicks to sell cars and to appease the law makers of the EU who do not know much about anything let about cars I want a basic car to which I can add the things I want or need not all the useless gimmicks fitted to today’s cars
Buy a refurbished Morris Minor
Just use
a slave battery connected to the car leads while the new battery is fitted.This maintains continuous power and saves recoding.
Hi Dennis, like you I believe this would solve the battery change issue. When the tyre fitters had the car back to solve the tyre pressure warning light problem they disconnected the battery without me knowing to try and reset the cars computer, in the vain hope it would reset the tyre warning light. The car still worked when I got it back, but the electric seats and interior/vanity lights would not work correctly and the warning light remained on. So I took it to the nice people at Toyota Plymouth who fitted and invoiced for the new valves, and corrected the seats, lights and not so straight electronic steering for nothing.
Who is your car manufacturer? In the interests of saving money, i’ll go elsewhere!
The manufacturer is Toyota although this is somewhat irrelavent as I’ve spoken to others who have paid more for tyre valves on Renault, BMW etc. My research, which maybe somewhat flawed as most was done on the internet, has shown USA had the tyre pressure warning system put on cars and the EU then decided it was a good safety feature. The EU have been trying to get this system fitted to all cars, not just exspensive marques, from 2012. If you want to avoid this cost don’t buy a car that has the system fitted. If it has, the battery in the tyre valve sender unit last on average around 10 years, so find out if they have been replaced and how many years left before replacement.
Can you let us know which car is it?
I would definitively try to avoid buying the same car .
Gotcha, see reply to Joan Newton please
You will buy these expensive cars.
Hear hear!
Government Ministers, who have official cars available, and full expenses for driving their own, are blind to people who live in communities away from the holy grail of public transport, and expect them to use taxi’s instead. All they are interested in is revenue and reducing the country’s Co2 levels.
They can reduce the co2 levels in this country by cutting the throats of the wimpering ministers in parliament. Oxygen theives all of them.
Any people who work for any government department get reduced prices for their car insurance, did you know that.
If the Government get their way you will either lose your job like many others; or give you a skateboard.
And who do you think will get your job/job’s Foreigners at a cheaper rate.
Hear hear John! And when you are lying in the cardiac care department you can tell the Polish anesthetist, the Syrian surgeon and the Spanish nurse that you don’t want their services either. Nothing like putting your principles to the test.
Ben, the best ever riposte I’ve ever seen. Great!!
I wouldn’t be unhappy with Chinese, Indonesian, Australian, etc let in under an immigration scheme. Incidentally we need so many more skills to cater for the massive influx free for all. Reposte away.
Ben
I agree with the principle of what you are saying.
But leaving the EU is not to stop foreigners coming here, it is to enable us to select which skills we need from people from anywhere in the world to work here and not have an open door policy forced on us by the EU.
It is to do with self destiny.
John If the EU get their way (which they always seem to do) they will introduce Insurance on golf buggies and invalid mobility scooters. These foreigners eh!!!
It’s going to get worse for Cornwall when we leave the EU, as Cornwall gets a lot of EU money.
The EU money that Cornwall receives comes from Britain`s contribution to the EU. If you pay me five pounds per week and I give you two pounds back, would you consider that to be a gift from me?
I cannot help thinking you are exaggerating the difficulty Phil. Life in Cornwall as in other parts of the UK managed not too badly before mass car ownership became the norm about 40 years ago.
I have lots of older friends without cars. They manage very well. You can afford a lot of taxis for the cost of running a car. They are fit as well because of walking a lot. I think car share (as in pool car) would be a good idea for people who don’t use daily. If you make daily trips you need a car.
There’s no way we could afford taxis. And what about disabled immobile people? Living in rural Cornwall walking is an option only if you CAN walk and are well enough to do so. Car pooling doesn’t exist in my area. And buses are 1 an hour. So sorry but most of your comments are irrelevant for people like me. By the way your older friends who manage very well? They are probably very affluent without the health problems that genuinely poor people are plagued with and cannot enjoy.
Totally agree with you Chrissie we now in West Cornwall used to be in BUDE nth Cornwall nearest hospital 45 miles away no railways no national express buses & imagine the cost of a taxi people suggesting this probably living 10 minutes away from these crucial services !
In agreement Phil. Lets put this in context for others who don’t live in Cornwall and can’t get to grips with our beautiful County. To get a McDonalds, not that I eat them, is a 50 mile round trip for me!
well at least that’s something to be grateful for!
It all makes one one wonder what on earth people did in the years BC, (before cars.)
Gary; It is curious that you cite the distance away that the nearest Mc Donalds is as a supposed problem but at least you have the sense to rarely use their facilities. Being far from one of their outlets has the following advantage: the type of clientele they and similar places like Burger King and KFC often attract have a tendency to despoil the environment by throwing rubbish out of cars as they go along. Be grateful,as you acknowledge yourself, that you live in a beautiful part of Britain.
Well said I live near Bristol the bus service is awful removal of many buses means we have to travel into town to get somewhere half an hour wasted that’s even if the bus turns up We have a Lidl nearby too far to walk and no bus directly there As a pensioner I struggle to keep a car on the road but cannot do without thanks to the rubbish transport system and taxis here are very expensive If I could not shop at Lidl and Aldi I would not be able to eat healthy food which I believe is very important. Sorry I did use public transport for 30 years when I lived in a city with great transport links Bristol could certainly learn from Manchester
Ha ha. Imagine it on the motorway!!
Great if you live in the city/suburbs, but not so good if you live in the country where there are fewer taxi’s, longer journeys and therefore higher charges. As for pool cars, in the country…yeah right.
Your own vehicle of some description is vital in the countryside.
Fortunately though Graham, the vast majority of the population don’t live in the country, by definition. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be the country any longer, it would be suburban or urban living.
And in order to first live in the country, don’t you need to be able to afford the expensive houses and by inference, earn or have plenty of (or enough) money to spend on things like… cars and driving?
Maybe I’m ignorant of country living as I don’t live in the country – happy to be corrected.
Demographics alone will be responsible for an increasing number of drivers no longer able to drive…Cost? not really but fewer workers coming to the UK will also contribute after 2019-that’s actually next year.
Only in your dreams will fewer people be coming to the UK. For the foreseeable future even more crowding, congestion and ever deteriorating roads will be our crosses to bear. Can anyone here honestly say that driving is a pleasure nowadays? It’s not just the expense of car ownership that will get people off the roads.
Fully agree, Jay, it seems that some properties around me in the inner city of Birmingham have at least 5 cars parked on the drive and in the road. They wouldn’t be seen dead walking, and even if living only 500 yards away, the kids must be driven to school. Buses are for scum, and decent people keep away from them, as assaults and murder is getting common. As for the new immigrants, any old clapped out blue smoking van will do, and as they don’t even bother with insurance or MOTs, they seem to get away with it constantly. If the vehicle is clamped, they just grind the clamp off and carry on as normal. They are never prosecuted and get away with murder. One law for them, one law for us.
If some people own a car they MUST use it to go anywhere and everywhere even though I would be quicker and easier to walk They are ashamed if seen using public Transport .what would the neighbours think ? Sit in traffic jams and drive round and round to find somewhere to park at great expense Just because the OWN a car How stupid are some people ?
Always the same. We’re just the mugs that supply the funds. Each year squeezed more and more and for what? Diabolical roads, severe congestion even in my rural area (thanks to mass house building but no improvement for the roads) and driving skills or just plain common sense in very short supply.
When electric cars become available more cheaply, servicing and repair charges (and possibly insurance) should reduce. ill “PetrolPrices be renamed ElectricPrices?
Hahahaha if your expecting insurance to come down then your just as deluded as the fools paying £2000 plus insurance for a 200 car…
The type of vehicle heavily influences insurance costs. Research before buying is a must to find the most cost effective vehicle. Finding out how initial costs balance against all known and potential future costs is invaluable for both new and used vehicle purchases.
When possible, alternative transportation is a good consideration, especially for urban dwellers.
Personal observations make me wonder why so many urbanites drive SUVs that are just not made for many city, town, and village roads, much less their expensive budget impacts.
Perhaps fewer vehicles is not such a bad thing.
vehicle also influences tax as well. I went from a 1.4l petrol car to a 1.6l diesel, and the tax which I pay monthly went down by £8 a month, almost half what I was paying, a couple of years ago I changed from a 1.4 litre fiesta to a 2litre 4×4, both petrol, the tax was the same, but the insurance on the 4×4 was cheaper. not sure what formulae these people use to come up with the prices, but it doesn’t make much sense to me.
Insurance is the killer. My godson, who at age 36 had driven his employer’s vans without mishap for several years, was charged over £2000 for a year’s premium on his first car, a second-hand Fabia which cost only £3800 to buy. That was the lowest price found on comparison websites. If he had been 18 and just passed his test God knows what he would have had to pay.
There must come a point when silly unaffordable premiums merely encourage people to risk driving uninsured with all the dire consequences of that. I don’t know the answer to this, or even if there is one.
Third party, fire and theft is often a good alternative.
As I understand it, third party, fire and theft can be (literally) more expensive because the driver is seen by the insurance company as a bad risk.
Sometimes its no cheaper, you must check first.
“52% of motorists giving up their cars”…..? What a totally ludicrous idea. Most motorists would sell a kidney before they gave up!
And in any case Insurance cost isn’t high for every motorist, if you insist on buying a brand new car every 3 years then guess what, you are going to have higher premiums for cars that are becoming ever more expensive to repair.
Yeah, I was fairly surprised at the crazy numbers in this post. Some examples:
“the average annual premium is £758” – I haven’t paid that much for insurance in 20 years! I think I pay between £200 and £300 and I’m in my 30s. What’s “the average” driver driving that costs so much to insure!?
“causing 52% of people to say that they may need to give up their car” – then half of car buyers stretch their budget for a car they can’t really afford to continue to run. That’s insane! Martin Lewis will be very disappointed.
“with 1 in 10 paying up to £1000” – does this mean that 9 in 10 are paying more than £1000? No. It’s just badly worded statistics.
Then there’s the headline:
“Motorists may not to be able to afford driving in 2018” – they will, just perhaps not the car they currently have. :rollseyes:
I am a 73 year old disabled driver and got my new insurance premium from the AA and it had jumped £ 176.00 on top of the rip off price I paid the year before taking it to almost £500.00 a year needless to say I went on comparethemarket.com and got the same coverage as the AA for just £245.00 from Tesco insurance,
I once had an old astra van with no turbo and an old escort estate no turbo, both diesels and they both use to give me 88 mpg and both used to pass the mot’s with flying colours, what has gone wrong with the car makers of today.
the biggest con is phasing out ( admittedly long term and could change ) of diesel cars but not busses/shipping/lorries/vans/coaches it is just another excuse to put taxes up because most diesel cars are clean but the same cannot be said for the others mentioned
Diesel busses pump out some nasty black deposits and they say our cars are polluting? Our cars are not driven 12 hours a day pumping noxious fumes into the atmosphere. But i guess thats ok because the bus companies are in bed with the authorities… Makes me puke!
Yes, diesel buses run long hours and belch out more harmful emissions than diesel cars, but how many diesel cars are there for every bus?
Has anyone tried car sharing to save costs?
I’ve found someone to share my daily commute with, have halved my petrol costs per month and have taken one car off the road so also saving the planet in my own little way! Here’s the link: https://liftshare.com/uk
I think the advent of on-demand car sharing services will be really interesting (they’re already appearing elsewhere in the world). The next 10 years could completely shake up not only this debate but the whole industry.
Electric, automated cars won’t need owners. Just users.
I realise that’s not an argument for today, but at least it’s a ‘solution’ for the relatively near-term future.
The simple answer is to take out all the unnecessary technology that we don’t need or particularly want and provide vehicles which are affordable reliable and cheap to repair. The Morris 1000 Citroen 2cv and the VW beetle spring to mind.
Outlaw the ambulance chasing lawyers, then we might get cheaper insurance.
I agree wholeheartedly. There are way too many sensors on new cars, guaranteeing a dealer gets maximum bucks out of owners to service and fix them. Many of those sensors have been set up to stop you driving when in reality they’re not ‘show stoppers’ or for things that would endanger the car, its occupants or anyone else.
We now have cars that self park or apply brakes in an emergency ! In my day (Morris 1000 era) when l was ‘taught’ how to drive properly, there was no need for such expensive ‘gadgetary’.
Myself and my partner enjoy driving our K reg Nissan Sunny which has none of these fancy gadgets. It has manual locking, windy-down windows and hardly anything to go wrong. We have had it for nearly six years (bought with only 26,000 on the clock for £350), and it has gone through every MOT, our mechanic says he loves working on it because it there is nothing on it to go wrong!
I love that phrase “windy-down” windows!
What about a Dacia,fits all you are seeking.
Brilliant car the Dacia,have owned one now for 3yrs,cheap to run 65mpg,clean diesel,no road tax, bet the government hate me!!!
I bet the government will change that in the next couple of years when there aren’t any cars left on the roads, as they will need money from somewhere and they will jump on these electric cars as well.
Not knocking Dacia but I bet it has an ECU and maybe more computer circuits fitted, I would like a car without such devices just plain and simple like they used to be in my young days. Simple old fashioned wiring looms from switch to lights and such, something anyone with a bit of knowledge can fix.
around 7 and a half million drivers in the uk may have to sell their cars as they can’t afford to run them ? yeah, right, saying it and doing it are 2 very different things, I would be shocked if 7 and a half million drivers give up their vehicle this year. it isn’t going to happen, i’d be very surprised if even half a million actually do it.
That was my assumption the first time I read it, and I think the crap wording of this post is intentionally intended to infer that. But even if 20% of motorists had to sell their car this year because they can’t afford to run it, that doesn’t mean they won’t replace it with a car they can afford.
But you’re right. They may say it, but I doubt they’ll do it.
London need to clean up there city before preaching and peinalising the rest of the country,
What we need is another Guy Fawkes.
But a sucessful one.
The Government planned this they don’t give a hoot about british .
They dont search in there pockets for coppers if they go over at the pumps.
Its in their allowance.
Amen
John, I have been saying that for the last 40 years, but that is what this country needs the we might get a government that could rule this country properly, stop giving all our money away, get out of this EU without paying those crooks a penny, get rid of all these non working migrants,close all our boarders, pay a little more into the NHS then we might get back to something like normal, and of cause drop the price of fuel as it is the drivers and the fuel consumption that keeps this country running.
The fairest solution would be to abandon the Road Fund Tax & put it on the fuel cost ,thus the heavy road user would pay pro rata for the privilege & low users would benefit.
A few years back i only did 1,200 miles but still had to pay £305.
Paid almost as much on the tax as the petrol lol.
I bought my new car first brand new one in my life as I got a great deal in fact only used one I could find was dearer than the brand new one, I am pensioner with mobility problems, just 7 years old and only done 4,750 miles, never exceeded 1,000 in a year and only ever carried driver.
Denis: A problem with your suggestion relates to the use of public roads for parking. In a fair system those who use public roads for storage of vehicles should have to pay for doing so and without amendments to your proposal that would not be the case. In many urban areas dwellings do not have their associated parking places leading to roads cluttered with parked vehicles and therefore impeding traffic flow and although the residents can not avoid doing it (if they are to have cars) they are causing a nuisance and should pay for the privilege. A further and related problem is that under your proposal, at least in its basic form, there would be little incentive to remove a scrap or unwanted from the road but instead to leave it there leading to yet more clutter.
The cost of driving now is diabolical the goverment want more people to use public transport why!!!! the trains are expensive overcrowded and late same with buses so lets penalise the motorist again and again and again
Using local buses is all very well but it’s a vicious spiral. My local buses services are constantly being reduced, routes amalgamated to save money, fewer runs per hour etc because fares are high and fewer people are using buses. If more people gave up their cars and used buses, do you really think your local authority is going to spend MORE money, put on more buses and more routes? Not a chance, though I would love to be proved wrong.
well the guverment want all this as its tax they wast so much they blame the old for the NHS but we payed in it for years I think if they had the olds to buget as the mps haven’t got a clue thay are brain dead
Lower insurance? Stop the ambulance chasers, take sex, age, location, disability and job title/status out of the equation for working out insurance and base it purely on how long you’ve been driving and how good a driver you are (or not) and we’d all start having cheaper insurance. The car insurance industry is the most discriminating industry going in this country and yet they get away with it! Oh, and as for car pools, didn’t Keith Moon try that?
Electric cars hardly need any servicing and save on average £100 per 1000 miles in fuel. Once they become cheaper than petrol/diesel cars (around 2020) then the costs will go down.
your living in dream land with rising electricity prices, and as the government has done before they will change VED to suit. The national grid can’t cope so we will have to pay more for Infrastructure !!!!!! so cost of electric goes up. The Government has already agreed to pay twice the price of todays electric to get foreigners to built the latest nuclear plants. When everyone goes electric and they are not bringing in any money (VED) do you think it will stay the same. Then someone discovers electric cars are not a green as they have predicted, ring any bells!!
More untaxed / uninsured and no MOT vehicles on the roads then as there’s no police on the roads !!
The less cars on the road the better. Aren’t they alwyas banging on about how bad they are? Next breath it’s how bad for the econony it would if we stop using them!
Mine’s insurance, it’s £388 a year. I always shopped around every year but I now have a “no fault” claim that cost just under £2000 to repair. It was a collision to the left side front of a Hyundai i10. It just looked like a cracked bumper and I was stunned at the repair cost. I made a claim on my insurance which was no problem at all with Aviva. I do have protected no claims which thankfully has kept the premiums stable since my claim.
Trouble is that if I shop around now I have to declare this claim and many insurance companies refuse to even quote. The rest want every single detail, the details of which I don’t even have, other driver etc.
Anyway, protected full no claims with courtesy vehicle on my 2013 Peugeot RCZ 156 GT is £388. My previous i10 was about £190 a year. Considering the change from a cheap 1.2 litre hatchback to a rather quick car that originally cost three times as much as the Hyundai is pretty good value.. but still expensive for me.
Well, in 10 to 20 years time many cars on the road will be driver-less. All you would need to do is download an app to your phone or computer and key in for a car to pick you up at a certain point at a certain time and take you to your destination! No tax, insurance, fuel or tip to worry about and you can have a drink on the way! No brainer!
Alan
Well, in 10 to 20 years time many cars on the road will be driver-less. All you would need to do is download an app to your phone or computer and key in for a car to pick you up at a certain point at a certain time and take you to your destination! No tax, insurance, fuel or tip to worry about and you can have a drink on the way! No brainer!
I would like to see cyclist have to have compulsory insurance. They use the road and are some of the worst offenders jumping light, riding on pavements etc. I believe in Holland they have to have insurance and a little licence plate
I live in Cornwall with a lack of public transport the only way of getting anywhere is a car whether it be work ,shopping Hospital treatment or just day to day living .It being one of the lowest paid areas I’m just wondering how folks are going cope !
By a horse
Did you k now that in the early 1900, London City Council was moaning because they were shifting over 100 ton of horse manure off the roads every day of the year? I bet that smell was far worse pollution than any vehicle today.
So in those days the Authorities had to put up with it from the road users – today it’s the road users who have to put with it from the Authorities!
Inconvenient, for sure. But that smell won’t kill you (if we’re only comparing smells).
Horse crap does not smell and is good for your garden, rose beds, and rubaharb.
By not paying for insurance or maintenance
This is only going to get worse as vehicles become more and more reliant on costly technology
Totally agree with your comment Alan. I’ve just had new tyres fitted to my car and the fitters could not re-code 2 of my tyre valves for the tyre inflation system built into the car. I had to go back to the manufacturer where 2 new tyre valves cost me £367. Where have the good old days gone where a tyre valve was only 50p on the invoice. Furthermore, the manufacturer warned me not to let anybody else change the battery, as the whole car electronics will need to be reset, something only they can do because the hardware/software to reprogramme is exclusive to them only.
You must own a BMW Gary?!?
Sorry, wrong guess-It’s a Toyota. Been speaking about this to others and it appears french cars have even dearer tyre valves, It has to be done otherwise it is a MOT failure if system is not functioning 100%.
Get a garage to deactivate it on the ecu, that should work.
Too many fancy gadgets on cars these that are not needed by most they are fitted as gimmicks to sell cars and to appease the law makers of the EU who do not know much about anything let about cars I want a basic car to which I can add the things I want or need not all the useless gimmicks fitted to today’s cars
Buy a refurbished Morris Minor
Just use
a slave battery connected to the car leads while the new battery is fitted.This maintains continuous power and saves recoding.
Hi Dennis, like you I believe this would solve the battery change issue. When the tyre fitters had the car back to solve the tyre pressure warning light problem they disconnected the battery without me knowing to try and reset the cars computer, in the vain hope it would reset the tyre warning light. The car still worked when I got it back, but the electric seats and interior/vanity lights would not work correctly and the warning light remained on. So I took it to the nice people at Toyota Plymouth who fitted and invoiced for the new valves, and corrected the seats, lights and not so straight electronic steering for nothing.
Who is your car manufacturer? In the interests of saving money, i’ll go elsewhere!
The manufacturer is Toyota although this is somewhat irrelavent as I’ve spoken to others who have paid more for tyre valves on Renault, BMW etc. My research, which maybe somewhat flawed as most was done on the internet, has shown USA had the tyre pressure warning system put on cars and the EU then decided it was a good safety feature. The EU have been trying to get this system fitted to all cars, not just exspensive marques, from 2012. If you want to avoid this cost don’t buy a car that has the system fitted. If it has, the battery in the tyre valve sender unit last on average around 10 years, so find out if they have been replaced and how many years left before replacement.
Can you let us know which car is it?
I would definitively try to avoid buying the same car .
Gotcha, see reply to Joan Newton please
You will buy these expensive cars.
Hear hear!
Government Ministers, who have official cars available, and full expenses for driving their own, are blind to people who live in communities away from the holy grail of public transport, and expect them to use taxi’s instead. All they are interested in is revenue and reducing the country’s Co2 levels.
They can reduce the co2 levels in this country by cutting the throats of the wimpering ministers in parliament. Oxygen theives all of them.
Any people who work for any government department get reduced prices for their car insurance, did you know that.
If the Government get their way you will either lose your job like many others; or give you a skateboard.
And who do you think will get your job/job’s Foreigners at a cheaper rate.
Hear hear John! And when you are lying in the cardiac care department you can tell the Polish anesthetist, the Syrian surgeon and the Spanish nurse that you don’t want their services either. Nothing like putting your principles to the test.
Ben, the best ever riposte I’ve ever seen. Great!!
I wouldn’t be unhappy with Chinese, Indonesian, Australian, etc let in under an immigration scheme. Incidentally we need so many more skills to cater for the massive influx free for all. Reposte away.
Ben
I agree with the principle of what you are saying.
But leaving the EU is not to stop foreigners coming here, it is to enable us to select which skills we need from people from anywhere in the world to work here and not have an open door policy forced on us by the EU.
It is to do with self destiny.
John If the EU get their way (which they always seem to do) they will introduce Insurance on golf buggies and invalid mobility scooters. These foreigners eh!!!
It’s going to get worse for Cornwall when we leave the EU, as Cornwall gets a lot of EU money.
The EU money that Cornwall receives comes from Britain`s contribution to the EU. If you pay me five pounds per week and I give you two pounds back, would you consider that to be a gift from me?
I cannot help thinking you are exaggerating the difficulty Phil. Life in Cornwall as in other parts of the UK managed not too badly before mass car ownership became the norm about 40 years ago.
I have lots of older friends without cars. They manage very well. You can afford a lot of taxis for the cost of running a car. They are fit as well because of walking a lot. I think car share (as in pool car) would be a good idea for people who don’t use daily. If you make daily trips you need a car.
There’s no way we could afford taxis. And what about disabled immobile people? Living in rural Cornwall walking is an option only if you CAN walk and are well enough to do so. Car pooling doesn’t exist in my area. And buses are 1 an hour. So sorry but most of your comments are irrelevant for people like me. By the way your older friends who manage very well? They are probably very affluent without the health problems that genuinely poor people are plagued with and cannot enjoy.
Totally agree with you Chrissie we now in West Cornwall used to be in BUDE nth Cornwall nearest hospital 45 miles away no railways no national express buses & imagine the cost of a taxi people suggesting this probably living 10 minutes away from these crucial services !
In agreement Phil. Lets put this in context for others who don’t live in Cornwall and can’t get to grips with our beautiful County. To get a McDonalds, not that I eat them, is a 50 mile round trip for me!
well at least that’s something to be grateful for!
It all makes one one wonder what on earth people did in the years BC, (before cars.)
Gary; It is curious that you cite the distance away that the nearest Mc Donalds is as a supposed problem but at least you have the sense to rarely use their facilities. Being far from one of their outlets has the following advantage: the type of clientele they and similar places like Burger King and KFC often attract have a tendency to despoil the environment by throwing rubbish out of cars as they go along. Be grateful,as you acknowledge yourself, that you live in a beautiful part of Britain.
Well said I live near Bristol the bus service is awful removal of many buses means we have to travel into town to get somewhere half an hour wasted that’s even if the bus turns up We have a Lidl nearby too far to walk and no bus directly there As a pensioner I struggle to keep a car on the road but cannot do without thanks to the rubbish transport system and taxis here are very expensive If I could not shop at Lidl and Aldi I would not be able to eat healthy food which I believe is very important. Sorry I did use public transport for 30 years when I lived in a city with great transport links Bristol could certainly learn from Manchester
Ha ha. Imagine it on the motorway!!
Great if you live in the city/suburbs, but not so good if you live in the country where there are fewer taxi’s, longer journeys and therefore higher charges. As for pool cars, in the country…yeah right.
Your own vehicle of some description is vital in the countryside.
Fortunately though Graham, the vast majority of the population don’t live in the country, by definition. Otherwise, it wouldn’t be the country any longer, it would be suburban or urban living.
And in order to first live in the country, don’t you need to be able to afford the expensive houses and by inference, earn or have plenty of (or enough) money to spend on things like… cars and driving?
Maybe I’m ignorant of country living as I don’t live in the country – happy to be corrected.
Demographics alone will be responsible for an increasing number of drivers no longer able to drive…Cost? not really but fewer workers coming to the UK will also contribute after 2019-that’s actually next year.
Only in your dreams will fewer people be coming to the UK. For the foreseeable future even more crowding, congestion and ever deteriorating roads will be our crosses to bear. Can anyone here honestly say that driving is a pleasure nowadays? It’s not just the expense of car ownership that will get people off the roads.
Fully agree, Jay, it seems that some properties around me in the inner city of Birmingham have at least 5 cars parked on the drive and in the road. They wouldn’t be seen dead walking, and even if living only 500 yards away, the kids must be driven to school. Buses are for scum, and decent people keep away from them, as assaults and murder is getting common. As for the new immigrants, any old clapped out blue smoking van will do, and as they don’t even bother with insurance or MOTs, they seem to get away with it constantly. If the vehicle is clamped, they just grind the clamp off and carry on as normal. They are never prosecuted and get away with murder. One law for them, one law for us.
If some people own a car they MUST use it to go anywhere and everywhere even though I would be quicker and easier to walk They are ashamed if seen using public Transport .what would the neighbours think ? Sit in traffic jams and drive round and round to find somewhere to park at great expense Just because the OWN a car How stupid are some people ?
Always the same. We’re just the mugs that supply the funds. Each year squeezed more and more and for what? Diabolical roads, severe congestion even in my rural area (thanks to mass house building but no improvement for the roads) and driving skills or just plain common sense in very short supply.
When electric cars become available more cheaply, servicing and repair charges (and possibly insurance) should reduce. ill “PetrolPrices be renamed ElectricPrices?
Hahahaha if your expecting insurance to come down then your just as deluded as the fools paying £2000 plus insurance for a 200 car…
The type of vehicle heavily influences insurance costs. Research before buying is a must to find the most cost effective vehicle. Finding out how initial costs balance against all known and potential future costs is invaluable for both new and used vehicle purchases.
When possible, alternative transportation is a good consideration, especially for urban dwellers.
Personal observations make me wonder why so many urbanites drive SUVs that are just not made for many city, town, and village roads, much less their expensive budget impacts.
Perhaps fewer vehicles is not such a bad thing.
vehicle also influences tax as well. I went from a 1.4l petrol car to a 1.6l diesel, and the tax which I pay monthly went down by £8 a month, almost half what I was paying, a couple of years ago I changed from a 1.4 litre fiesta to a 2litre 4×4, both petrol, the tax was the same, but the insurance on the 4×4 was cheaper. not sure what formulae these people use to come up with the prices, but it doesn’t make much sense to me.
Insurance is the killer. My godson, who at age 36 had driven his employer’s vans without mishap for several years, was charged over £2000 for a year’s premium on his first car, a second-hand Fabia which cost only £3800 to buy. That was the lowest price found on comparison websites. If he had been 18 and just passed his test God knows what he would have had to pay.
There must come a point when silly unaffordable premiums merely encourage people to risk driving uninsured with all the dire consequences of that. I don’t know the answer to this, or even if there is one.
Third party, fire and theft is often a good alternative.
As I understand it, third party, fire and theft can be (literally) more expensive because the driver is seen by the insurance company as a bad risk.
Sometimes its no cheaper, you must check first.
“52% of motorists giving up their cars”…..? What a totally ludicrous idea. Most motorists would sell a kidney before they gave up!
And in any case Insurance cost isn’t high for every motorist, if you insist on buying a brand new car every 3 years then guess what, you are going to have higher premiums for cars that are becoming ever more expensive to repair.
Yeah, I was fairly surprised at the crazy numbers in this post. Some examples:
“the average annual premium is £758” – I haven’t paid that much for insurance in 20 years! I think I pay between £200 and £300 and I’m in my 30s. What’s “the average” driver driving that costs so much to insure!?
“causing 52% of people to say that they may need to give up their car” – then half of car buyers stretch their budget for a car they can’t really afford to continue to run. That’s insane! Martin Lewis will be very disappointed.
“with 1 in 10 paying up to £1000” – does this mean that 9 in 10 are paying more than £1000? No. It’s just badly worded statistics.
Then there’s the headline:
“Motorists may not to be able to afford driving in 2018” – they will, just perhaps not the car they currently have. :rollseyes:
I am a 73 year old disabled driver and got my new insurance premium from the AA and it had jumped £ 176.00 on top of the rip off price I paid the year before taking it to almost £500.00 a year needless to say I went on comparethemarket.com and got the same coverage as the AA for just £245.00 from Tesco insurance,
I once had an old astra van with no turbo and an old escort estate no turbo, both diesels and they both use to give me 88 mpg and both used to pass the mot’s with flying colours, what has gone wrong with the car makers of today.
the biggest con is phasing out ( admittedly long term and could change ) of diesel cars but not busses/shipping/lorries/vans/coaches it is just another excuse to put taxes up because most diesel cars are clean but the same cannot be said for the others mentioned
Diesel busses pump out some nasty black deposits and they say our cars are polluting? Our cars are not driven 12 hours a day pumping noxious fumes into the atmosphere. But i guess thats ok because the bus companies are in bed with the authorities… Makes me puke!
Yes, diesel buses run long hours and belch out more harmful emissions than diesel cars, but how many diesel cars are there for every bus?
Has anyone tried car sharing to save costs?
I’ve found someone to share my daily commute with, have halved my petrol costs per month and have taken one car off the road so also saving the planet in my own little way! Here’s the link: https://liftshare.com/uk
I think the advent of on-demand car sharing services will be really interesting (they’re already appearing elsewhere in the world). The next 10 years could completely shake up not only this debate but the whole industry.
Electric, automated cars won’t need owners. Just users.
I realise that’s not an argument for today, but at least it’s a ‘solution’ for the relatively near-term future.
The simple answer is to take out all the unnecessary technology that we don’t need or particularly want and provide vehicles which are affordable reliable and cheap to repair. The Morris 1000 Citroen 2cv and the VW beetle spring to mind.
Outlaw the ambulance chasing lawyers, then we might get cheaper insurance.
I agree wholeheartedly. There are way too many sensors on new cars, guaranteeing a dealer gets maximum bucks out of owners to service and fix them. Many of those sensors have been set up to stop you driving when in reality they’re not ‘show stoppers’ or for things that would endanger the car, its occupants or anyone else.
We now have cars that self park or apply brakes in an emergency ! In my day (Morris 1000 era) when l was ‘taught’ how to drive properly, there was no need for such expensive ‘gadgetary’.
Myself and my partner enjoy driving our K reg Nissan Sunny which has none of these fancy gadgets. It has manual locking, windy-down windows and hardly anything to go wrong. We have had it for nearly six years (bought with only 26,000 on the clock for £350), and it has gone through every MOT, our mechanic says he loves working on it because it there is nothing on it to go wrong!
I love that phrase “windy-down” windows!
What about a Dacia,fits all you are seeking.
Brilliant car the Dacia,have owned one now for 3yrs,cheap to run 65mpg,clean diesel,no road tax, bet the government hate me!!!
I bet the government will change that in the next couple of years when there aren’t any cars left on the roads, as they will need money from somewhere and they will jump on these electric cars as well.
Not knocking Dacia but I bet it has an ECU and maybe more computer circuits fitted, I would like a car without such devices just plain and simple like they used to be in my young days. Simple old fashioned wiring looms from switch to lights and such, something anyone with a bit of knowledge can fix.
around 7 and a half million drivers in the uk may have to sell their cars as they can’t afford to run them ? yeah, right, saying it and doing it are 2 very different things, I would be shocked if 7 and a half million drivers give up their vehicle this year. it isn’t going to happen, i’d be very surprised if even half a million actually do it.
That was my assumption the first time I read it, and I think the crap wording of this post is intentionally intended to infer that. But even if 20% of motorists had to sell their car this year because they can’t afford to run it, that doesn’t mean they won’t replace it with a car they can afford.
But you’re right. They may say it, but I doubt they’ll do it.
London need to clean up there city before preaching and peinalising the rest of the country,
What we need is another Guy Fawkes.
But a sucessful one.
The Government planned this they don’t give a hoot about british .
They dont search in there pockets for coppers if they go over at the pumps.
Its in their allowance.
Amen
John, I have been saying that for the last 40 years, but that is what this country needs the we might get a government that could rule this country properly, stop giving all our money away, get out of this EU without paying those crooks a penny, get rid of all these non working migrants,close all our boarders, pay a little more into the NHS then we might get back to something like normal, and of cause drop the price of fuel as it is the drivers and the fuel consumption that keeps this country running.
The fairest solution would be to abandon the Road Fund Tax & put it on the fuel cost ,thus the heavy road user would pay pro rata for the privilege & low users would benefit.
A few years back i only did 1,200 miles but still had to pay £305.
Paid almost as much on the tax as the petrol lol.
I bought my new car first brand new one in my life as I got a great deal in fact only used one I could find was dearer than the brand new one, I am pensioner with mobility problems, just 7 years old and only done 4,750 miles, never exceeded 1,000 in a year and only ever carried driver.
Denis: A problem with your suggestion relates to the use of public roads for parking. In a fair system those who use public roads for storage of vehicles should have to pay for doing so and without amendments to your proposal that would not be the case. In many urban areas dwellings do not have their associated parking places leading to roads cluttered with parked vehicles and therefore impeding traffic flow and although the residents can not avoid doing it (if they are to have cars) they are causing a nuisance and should pay for the privilege. A further and related problem is that under your proposal, at least in its basic form, there would be little incentive to remove a scrap or unwanted from the road but instead to leave it there leading to yet more clutter.
The cost of driving now is diabolical the goverment want more people to use public transport why!!!! the trains are expensive overcrowded and late same with buses so lets penalise the motorist again and again and again
Using local buses is all very well but it’s a vicious spiral. My local buses services are constantly being reduced, routes amalgamated to save money, fewer runs per hour etc because fares are high and fewer people are using buses. If more people gave up their cars and used buses, do you really think your local authority is going to spend MORE money, put on more buses and more routes? Not a chance, though I would love to be proved wrong.
well the guverment want all this as its tax they wast so much they blame the old for the NHS but we payed in it for years I think if they had the olds to buget as the mps haven’t got a clue thay are brain dead
Lower insurance? Stop the ambulance chasers, take sex, age, location, disability and job title/status out of the equation for working out insurance and base it purely on how long you’ve been driving and how good a driver you are (or not) and we’d all start having cheaper insurance. The car insurance industry is the most discriminating industry going in this country and yet they get away with it! Oh, and as for car pools, didn’t Keith Moon try that?
Electric cars hardly need any servicing and save on average £100 per 1000 miles in fuel. Once they become cheaper than petrol/diesel cars (around 2020) then the costs will go down.
your living in dream land with rising electricity prices, and as the government has done before they will change VED to suit. The national grid can’t cope so we will have to pay more for Infrastructure !!!!!! so cost of electric goes up. The Government has already agreed to pay twice the price of todays electric to get foreigners to built the latest nuclear plants. When everyone goes electric and they are not bringing in any money (VED) do you think it will stay the same. Then someone discovers electric cars are not a green as they have predicted, ring any bells!!
More untaxed / uninsured and no MOT vehicles on the roads then as there’s no police on the roads !!
The less cars on the road the better. Aren’t they alwyas banging on about how bad they are? Next breath it’s how bad for the econony it would if we stop using them!
Mine’s insurance, it’s £388 a year. I always shopped around every year but I now have a “no fault” claim that cost just under £2000 to repair. It was a collision to the left side front of a Hyundai i10. It just looked like a cracked bumper and I was stunned at the repair cost. I made a claim on my insurance which was no problem at all with Aviva. I do have protected no claims which thankfully has kept the premiums stable since my claim.
Trouble is that if I shop around now I have to declare this claim and many insurance companies refuse to even quote. The rest want every single detail, the details of which I don’t even have, other driver etc.
Anyway, protected full no claims with courtesy vehicle on my 2013 Peugeot RCZ 156 GT is £388. My previous i10 was about £190 a year. Considering the change from a cheap 1.2 litre hatchback to a rather quick car that originally cost three times as much as the Hyundai is pretty good value.. but still expensive for me.
Well, in 10 to 20 years time many cars on the road will be driver-less. All you would need to do is download an app to your phone or computer and key in for a car to pick you up at a certain point at a certain time and take you to your destination! No tax, insurance, fuel or tip to worry about and you can have a drink on the way! No brainer!
Alan
Well, in 10 to 20 years time many cars on the road will be driver-less. All you would need to do is download an app to your phone or computer and key in for a car to pick you up at a certain point at a certain time and take you to your destination! No tax, insurance, fuel or tip to worry about and you can have a drink on the way! No brainer!
I would like to see cyclist have to have compulsory insurance. They use the road and are some of the worst offenders jumping light, riding on pavements etc. I believe in Holland they have to have insurance and a little licence plate