Exactly right Si. Anyone going to the show needs to talk to as many part/mod suppliers as possible and voice the concerns. ie. " I would buy this £800 ohlins shock right now with cash, but Im worried about my insurance with bennetts, as I already have a tank pad, a rear hugger and a help for heroes sticker on my bike, so i better not"
Ok I was at the nev from 10 amanf got homeat 7 but did not see bennetts at all. Carol Nash but no bennetts. I told my mates about this so they kept there eye open for them. So I had no chance toast them but did bloody looker them
Just sat here at my desk and a thought popped into my head, most of us replace our numberplate with a slightly smaller one, this is a mod but not a mod you can tell your insurance company. So does changing your number plate mean you have modified your bike without telling your insurance and therefore invalidate your cover when you have a heavy claim against you????
Right gentleman, I have made contact with MCE and ask them for their policy on Mod and her is their reply: Hi Carl Thanks for your email, more than happy to give you our thoughts! Please see our below statement. At MCE we do not have any limits to the number of modifications we can quote for. The fact is we love them, more modifications makes the MCE team merry! Lots of mods usually mean more enthusiastic bikers and as a company if we aren’t catering for the most passionate of bikers, we aren’t fulfilling our purpose. The rating (premium price) will be effected based on whether the modification is performance enhancing or purely cosmetic. And we aren’t talking ridiculous premiums either – they are treated on an individual basis to suit the bespoke requirements of the bike in question. Accordingly I have never heard of a customer who hasn’t been impressed with our mod policies. If there is anything else I can help with – any questions you would like me to further answer or any feedback that comes as a result to respond to please do not hesitate to get in touch with me directly. Kind Regards, Emma Westley | Marketing Manager
Unfortunately I changed to Bennets this year, but they were the cheapest for me by a long way, so I guess you pay your money and take a chance. I have no love of insurance companies and could give numerous personal accounts of problems I have encountered with them, most not bike related. From a 'business' perspective Bennetts policy reference modifications is perhaps rather clever, certainly good for their business perhaps more so in the longer term. It has pretty much always been the case with many insurance companies to either not want to pay any claim or seriously reduce how much they pay. So if your bike has mods that the insurance company did not know about they can either say the insurance is invalid or there is a contributory factor which might reduce the payment.Hence they save money but still collect the premium. I expect that the 3 mod rule will become different and extra premium will be required above a base premium for each and every mod, depending upon the particular insurance company/underwriters.This way they make even more money, because even with a legitimate claim for a bike with all mods recorded, some of the replacement parts maybe cheaper than Honda parts. Unfortunately, they have probably done an enormous amount of research on the 'biker demographic'. Bikers pay quite large sums of money on motorbikes that they quite often have as pleasure items rather than a necessity. Once purchased we have a habit of wanting to personalise them with expensive accessories/modifications. I would not even consider spending £600 on an exhaust for my car but would part with £1400 for an Akro Evo for the bike. The insurance companies know we spend vast sums on our bikes and that we are passionate about our bikes and this all works in their favour. Whilst our instincts at the moment are basically saying they can get stuffed, I think it is unlikely many of us will give up biking over it, as much as we may hate what is happening. Unfortunately, I expect all but a few insurers will go down the same route and ultimately we will have no alternative other than to pay up. The alternartives are not viable for most of us, ie ride on uninsured bikes, ride on insured bikes that are modded without the insurance company knowing and hope we don't have to make a claim or just use tracks...or stop biking altogether.
Bennetts have already back pedalled on the 3 mod rule. Also if you have a mod, that was not disclosed to your insurer, they cannot cancel or refuse to pay unless the mod was contributory to the accident or theft. If the worst comes to the worst, spend your money on a good biking lawyer, and all should be ok
