Article | The Cost of Theft

Written by: Chris Knowles, Technical Director

The reality is between £1000 and £5000

For a typical insured UK motorist, a stolen car usually costs between £1000 and £5000

The costs associated with a stolen vehicle are huge and they often include a number of hidden costs that are overlooked.

I’ll explain the components, give a concrete worked example and list some quick tips to reduce the financial hit.

What makes it so expensive?

If you rely on a vehicle for your business, having it stolen incurs a whole raft of additional costs. These include:

Insurance excess – the fixed amount you pay when you claim (commonly between £250 and £1000, depending on policy).
Replacement shortfall – if insurer pays market value and you have to buy a similar car for more, you pay the difference.
Premium increases – a theft claim typically raises premiums. Typical extra cost might be a few hundred pounds per year for several years (so total hundreds to low thousands).
Uninsured losses – personal items stolen from the car, loss of private number plates, etc.
Immediate expenses – taxis, car hire, vehicle recovery or storage fees, admin time.
No claims bonus loss – losing part or all of your no claims discount can add cost over a few years unless you have protected no claims.
Emotional/inconvenience cost – hard to monetise but real.

Concrete Example

Lets assume the current used market value is £8000, comprehensive insurance with £500 excess and annual premium before theft of £800. Let’s also be conservative!

Insurance excess – £500
Replace with a similar vehicle costing £10000, gap £2000
Increased insurance premium of £200 per year for 3 years – £600
Vehicle hire while without vehicle, say 20 days at £50/day – £1000

That’s a total of: £4100

How do I reduce this risk?

Most of the costs in the example above are simply from not recovering your vehicle. The quicker you can recover your vehicle, the less money you are going to lose.

That is why we recommend the Pay as you Track Recover solution. We designed this solution specifically to make sure you can get your vehicle back in the event of a a theft.

Talk to Pay as you Track on 0151 914 5500 to discuss our solution or contact us at [email protected]

Ready to take your fleet to the next level?

When Theft Bypasses Your Tracker