Liabilty Insurance

peteb2

Insurance12 wrote:

Come on now, I commute everywhere and an accident at speed be it on ice or any other reason could really hurt someone, is wanting to get insurance for protection that much of issue? I mean the story of the old man in Dublin and seeing a woman go down on black ice recently made me think it would be a good idea as I realise going into someone at speed can do them and me serious damage and would like cover I am not saying it should be mandatory just I would like to get it.

Your contents cover will give you personal public liability will cover it . Happened to someone I know. Went through a red light. Hit pedestrian. Broken jaw. Household contents policy picked up cost.

Fighting Tao

I’m starting to think this thread is a wind up. It’s getting ridiculous.

Lumen

The only purpose of car insurance is to discourage people from crashing by increasing their premium. If minor accidents were much more painful then we would be able to socialise the human costs of accidents through taxes.

Fortunately crashing a bicycle hurts a lot, so we don't need insurance.

Kaisr Sose

Lumen wrote: »

The only purpose of car insurance is to discourage people from crashing by increasing their premium. If minor accidents were much more painful then we would be able to socialise the human costs of accidents through taxes.

Fortunately crashing a bicycle hurts a lot, so we don't need insurance.

How does this theory provide for damage to property (other car/a wall etc?)

Lusk_Doyle

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Ok, i'll play...

So you're a pretty unfortunate cyclist, you scrape a parked car, are you going to write down your insurance details and leave them on the windshield?
So off you toddle happy as larry that your 50 quid insurance will pay out for say €350 worth of paint damage..
Then the next month you knock the mirror of a Merc while filtering in traffic, and boy they ain't cheap! So another €700 for the mirror...
Wow you're really clocking up the claims eh?

So insurance company says, renewal time, oh €750 for the year please... Ah but my bicycle is worth €500... Opps!

Apples with oranges. You ain't insuring the bike.

Tenzor07

Lusk_Doyle wrote: »

Apples with oranges. You ain't insuring the bike.

Yea though the guy was talking about bicycle insurance which offers the same liability cover as motor insurance...

usernamegoes

Tenzor07 wrote: »

Ireland is turning into a really horrible litigious society, not far behind America i'd say!

Someone is always to blame for whatever misfortune should happen to us, slipped in the supermarket(because you ignored the wet floor sign).. Claim!... Bus driver had to hit the brakes and you hit your leg or something (because you didn't hold the handrail).. Claim!... Tripped up on the footpath(because you weren't looking).. Claim!

There's a middle ground. If you or yours cause injury or damage to another though your negligence then you should pay. Way should the injured party pay? Now of course we need to look at the concept of what constitutes negligence. I would not be in favor of "Contents Hot" on coffee cups or that kind of thing

But I don't see what's controversial about the belief that if you for example cycle on the footpath and run into a pedestrian and injure them and break their expensive watch that the pedestrian should have to pay for it even though they did nothing wrong (assuming they were just walking along and didn't contribute to the accident.) or if your child throws a tantrum in a restaurant runs off and knocks over a tea pot scalding the diner and spilling it on their laptop breaking it. Why should they be out of pocket? Why should the restaurant's insurance have to pay?

magicbastarder

partly because that's probably one of the very things the restaurant takes out insurance to cover?
anyway, what's the alternative? toddler insurance?

anyway, even if you accept all the above, i can't see how third party insurance for cyclists would ever be anything but a $50 solution to a $5 problem. the cost to society of not having it is a fraction of the cost there would be if it was ever introduced (as mandatory).

CramCycle

MOD VOICE: and I am sure I have been one of those who made this error. The thread asked about insurance for cyclists and where to get it or could it be gotten as the OP wants to protect themselves against a financial outlay if they cause a massive accident.

Several threads have detailed why mandatory insurance for cyclists and pedestrians is a bad idea. This thread is getting close to that line of discussion again and it is just a mess to moderate and deal with as people don't seem to understand why motor insurance was made mandatory.

Lets focus on where the OP can get insurance, if it is even possible and why they should or should not do this.

usernamegoes

magicbastarder wrote: »

partly because that's probably one of the very things the restaurant takes out insurance to cover?
anyway, what's the alternative? toddler insurance?

anyway, even if you accept all the above, i can't see how third party insurance for cyclists would ever be anything but a $50 solution to a $5 problem. the cost to society of not having it is a fraction of the cost there would be if it was ever introduced (as mandatory).

Restaurants have insurance to cover them for their own negligence. Now admittedly these days we have said a situation such as I described probably would be paid for from restaurant's insurance because we recognize that it's unfair for the injured party to get nothing so we've contacted the fiction to say it's the restaurant's fault when it's clearly not. It's unfair for the Restaurant's insurance to have to pay. What if it happened in a park?

The solution is people pay for their negligence and reasonable people will insure that risk like they do their house. I am not saying it should be law.

Lumen

Kaisr Sose wrote: »

How does this theory provide for damage to property (other car/a wall etc?)

Well, that can be covered by optional insurance, for which there's an incentive - to avoid those liabilities. Or it could be covered by the insurance of the person owning the wall.

But I'm trying to strip out that concern because it doesn't apply to bicycles.

If you remove the property damage aspect, the only cover required is to fix broken people, and we have a publicly funded health system for that.

This isn't some absurd fantasy, this is how it works in NZ, as I understand it.

https://www.newzealandnow.govt.nz/resources/insurance-in-new-zealand-a-guide-for-migrants

Most costs of injuries from accidents are covered by our accident compensation scheme, ACC.. ACC provides no-fault insurance cover to everyone in New Zealand for injuries resulting from accidents - everything from car crashes to injuries at work, slips, trips and falls at home or breaking your arm skiing, even if the person who is injured caused the accident. Due to the wide range of help available from ACC, you cannot sue for personal injury in New Zealand.

Think about that. An end to compo culture with the costs of providing medical services efficiently covered by the public health system.

http://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/10/28/whiplash-uncommon-new-zealand

I have definetly (sic) found that whiplash is very rare in New Zealand compared to the UK. When I was working around Liverpool it was not uncommon to see all four occupants of a car and then go and see the four from the other car, and it was a rare shift not seeing at least one whiplash injury. In New Zealand however I may see one or two a month, could it be that the ACC system which prevents litigation is responsable (sic)? They certainly don't drive any safer or have fewer accidents.

I guess spelling isn't a necessary skill in medicine.

Anyway, my point is that attitudes towards insurance and liabilities for cyclists are a consequence of our bizarre system of compensation.

peteb2

Simple answer is that cyclists liability as an every day person can be covered under a contents policy or household policy that includes contents. End of.