I’m a poor guy. I buy the cheapest car insurance i.e. Third Party cover at Rs 4,500 per year. I pay Road Tax on a yearly basis at Rs 3500. That makes a total of Rs 8000 I have to pay just for the papers to keep my car road legal.
During the government imposed lock-down due to Covid-19, all our cars, except for essential service workers’, were parked. It stayed so for 2 months. If we were to put a number on it, we paid Rs 1,333 for nothing.
Rs 8000 / 12 months * 2 months = Rs 1,333
Now if you have Premium Insurance policies, this amount will be much higher. My car’s insurance and Road Tax expired in March 2020. Today I got them renewed. No free months given 🙁
Should we fight to get this money back in some form or another or it’s not worth it?
For the rich, Rs 1,333 is nothing.
For someone with minimum salary, that’s 13% of his salary being given away.
I disagree. During this confinement period, you still have the right to drive to pharmacy, hospital or to supermarket (on your allocated days). And in case of any accident, the insurance would come into play.
Now, if you really did not drive at all, it is a bit your choice (and a really good one, kudos), but your car was still covered. This said, let’s say that someone really know that he won’t drive for 6 months, he can ask the insurance company to cancel his insurance and the pro-rata amount will normally be reimbursed.
Now, if insurance companies were of good faith and they knew that they barely made any loss because of very low (or none) accident rate, they could have paid back the Rs1333 or consider a discount for next premium. This has been done in some companies but however, here in Mauritius, it has been reported that some companies even increased their premium by up to 15% I think.
As for parking slot (or same can be for gyms or even, paying schools), that’s unfortunately an agreement in between you and the company.