Cars with mods that are not declared

L0rdMike said:
You phone them up when you change your discs and pads?
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"Tell us about any changes from factory" is so open to interpretation.

What happens if you change the tyres? Is that a "mod"? Or if you change the trim on the inside of your car? Or if you change the gear knob for a nicer one? or the steering wheel? Or if you use pattern parts instead of OEM ones?
 
I am pulling figures out the air here, but from people I know that have remaps, none of them have declared them. Regardless of the date that they were fitted, how would somebody know that their car has one?

I bet most people on here at some point have purchased a used car from a dealer at some point - How would you know if it had a performance remap or not?
 
By driving it - there is no way you'd mistake any remapped car i've had or been in for a standard one. If you'd never driven a standard car then ok you've got more of an excuse, but I still dont buy it and I very much doubt Mr Insurance would either if he had the inclination to check.

May well be something that could be argued out of, but it would be a long fight.
 
According to my insurance company air filters, brake pads/discs, tyres, etc are consumables so not classed as modification, other companies may be different though.
 
OpenToSuggestions said:
I am pulling figures out the air here, but from people I know that have remaps, none of them have declared them. Regardless of the date that they were fitted, how would somebody know that their car has one?

I bet most people on here at some point have purchased a used car from a dealer at some point - How would you know if it had a performance remap or not?
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When it comes to the Focus ST that I own, it's really easy to tell, the boost gauge is up at around 1.2bar instead of 0.6 it usually runs.
 
The only experience I've had of this was when a friend of mine wrote his car off. It had aftermarket alloys, exhaust system, induction and various modifications to the ECU to disable TCS etc

We found out which garage the car had been taken too, took the stock parts with us and set about swapping all the bits over. We were doing that when the assesor showed up. His words were to the effect of "As long as you don't leave it with no wheels or exhaust, carry on". That was a ~£3k car, and they didn't care at all about the numerous undeclared mods.
 
factory fitted mods is to do with how much they give you if they write the car off, if you paid say £5000 on top of a £15,000 car and didnt disclose the changes they would look at a proportional settlement, so basically you tell them my car is worth £20k they would take a 1/4 off the amount because thats the true difference in value of whats been advised.

The same for Aftermarket changes, theres very few reasons why an insurance company will throw out a claim, high value claim + mods is the one you will read about the most, if mods are not declared, they will normally charge you the difference in premium for the year, possible void from inception if the mods done is something they dont cover (engine transplants etc) or again as mentioned earlier, proportional settlements.

Same with all T&C with insurance, you can risk it and come out smiling because you saved a few pound or you can end up with nothing, being quite seriously injured or worst and then blame yourself :)
 
GeX said:
The only experience I've had of this was when a friend of mine wrote his car off. It had aftermarket alloys, exhaust system, induction and various modifications to the ECU to disable TCS etc

We found out which garage the car had been taken too, took the stock parts with us and set about swapping all the bits over. We were doing that when the assesor showed up. His words were to the effect of "As long as you don't leave it with no wheels or exhaust, carry on". That was a ~£3k car, and they didn't care at all about the numerous undeclared mods.
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Sounds like he had a small ding though. What about if it had wrapped it around a tree and he had a broken leg? Can't put the standard alloys back on then!
 
On a slightly different note - Who is good to go with for a remap? Adrian Flux couldn't offer me anything good, even if I waited until Oct when I have 7 years driving and 3 years NCB - They want me to be 25 really.
 
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OpenToSuggestions said:
Sounds like he had a small ding though. What about if it had wrapped it around a tree and he had a broken leg? Can't put the standard alloys back on then!
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Car left the road on a country lane, backwards through a hedge. Big rock took out the engine / gearbox. Insurance company were paying out £3k for the car, plus recovery plus hire car. They didn't refuse to payout for any of the undeclared mods though :confused:
 
On a side note I got quotes for a standard SJ & quotes for a heavily modded SJ & the Heavily modded quote was cheaper. :confused:
 
Quite common - I can insure the civic for about £150 less than I do at the moment with the map declared when with the same insurer the standard car would cost around what I pay now. As the Mrs was under 25 when I took the policy out she ramped the cost up big time with the more specialist insurer so i'm still with Admiral who charged me very little for the mapped car over standard.
 
rodenal said:
Quite common - I can insure the civic for about £150 less than I do at the moment with the map declared when with the same insurer the standard car would cost around what I pay now. As the Mrs was under 25 when I took the policy out she ramped the cost up big time with the more specialist insurer so i'm still with Admiral who charged me very little for the mapped car over standard.
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Oh do tell how much more? How did you go about it?
I have looked on confused.com for a quick look and Admiral were as bad as Elephant (who I am with now), which did not suprise me as Admiral/Elephant/Bell/Diamond are all the same company.
 
Tbh I just used the site to get a quote and put the map in as a chip in the online tool - then when I actually called r.e the quote I explained it was a remap not a chip, got a semi sensible person on the phone who said they only list chips not maps, but it was just an antiquated way of describing power increase and that they were happy the increase was declared.

Admiral/elephant et al have always been by far and away the best of the mainstream insurers for me, I paid the same as I do now for my mr2 turbo with a bhp increase a few years ago now - though to be fair the mrs wasn't on that policy and at the time I still had probably 3 years no claims.

Greenlight and sky are able to beat admiral significantly around the £150 I mentioned earlier which would bring it down to about £350 - 28 4 yrs no claims about double that licence held but their insurers obviously don't like under 25's as with the boss on there they either wont insure or increase it significantly. Oddly without her on the policy the admiral price increases. Have had a check at insurance with the mrs as the policy holder for next year with me as the named driver - exact same cost with admiral even though she has only 2 years no claims and is younger (though it's maybe a bit more complicated as i'm still the main driver)
 
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Admiral never asked me recently when i rang them, asked wether it has any modifications but never asked about factory extras.

Wording "Has the car been modified at all?"
 
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