The prices of compulsory insurance policies for drivers who commit the most serious offences may increase by up to several hundred per cent. Insurance companies will have access to such data from mid-June. The new solution will act preventively and force drivers to drive carefully and safely.
Despite the growing network of expressways and highways, Polish roads are still among the least safe in Europe, informs the Rzeczpospolita daily. Its journalists estimate that Poland is one of the leading places in terms of the number of road deaths in relation to the number of inhabitants.
In order to enforce a change in the behavior of drivers, linking the amount of additional burden for compulsory third party liability insurance of motor vehicle owners with penal points and fines imposed by the police is supposed to help.
“We have fought for this for years. We believe that this will significantly improve road safety”, says Jan Grzegorz Prądzyński, the president of the Polish Chamber of Insurance. He adds that when preparing the offer of the third-party liability insurance policy for the driver, the insurer has so far taken into account whether the driver has had any damage to his account.
The existing solution worked only after a road incident, in addition to a more serious nature, e.g. a collision – the damage must first happen in order to be able to charge the driver with an increased premium. According to “Rzeczpospolita”, the new solution will act preventively.
“Thanks to this, people moving safely on the roads will be able to count on more attractive rates than drivers breaking traffic regulations”, Bartosz Olszycki, a director of the communication products department at Warta Insurance.
From the beginning of the year, new regulations have been in force allowing the police to impose fines of up to 5,000 PLN, and at the confluence of offences up to 6,000 PLN. Data from the Ministry of Infrastructure show that following the tightening of the law, the number of accidents, as well as fatalities and injuries decreased.
Arkadiusz Słomczyński