New motor product includes cover for vehicle cloning

Having legal expenses insurance has become ever more important for motorists in recent years and is about to become much more so with the implementation of the Civil Liability Act, which was passed into law at the end of 2018.

At the time of writing, we still aren’t absolutely certain that the reforms will be introduced at the start of April, as planned, but it seems unlikely that the government will accede to calls to postpone implementation, at this late stage.

ARAG policyholders are already protected against the risks and demands of the new regime. We updated our motor policies last year, almost as soon as the measures became law, knowing that some policyholders insured in 2019 would need to make claims under the new system.

But there are other emerging and growing risks that modern motorists have to contend with, and ARAG is committed to offering the best protection available, which is why we have added a new motor product to our range, called Complete Motor Legal Solutions.

One such risk is the increasing problem of vehicle cloning. The sophistication of this crime varies from the theft of registration plates, often from a similar vehicle, to the complete replication of every identifying mark on a stolen one, including Vehicle Identification Numbers, enabling it to be sold to an innocent party.

More frequently however, new number plates seem to be purchased illegally rather than removed in the street, to facilitate lesser crimes like the evasion of speeding, parking and other fines. The first that the owner of a cloned vehicle is likely to know about it, is when they receive penalty notices or even a summons, in the post.

As our Underwriting and Marketing Director, David Haynes has commented:

All the data that we have seen shows that vehicle cloning is a growing problem that can cause massive headaches for innocent motorists. It can sometimes be months before a car owner realises that their vehicle has been cloned, by which time they could be facing multiple penalties and even criminal charges from several different authorities.

We’ve built vehicle cloning cover into our latest motor policy to protect owners against the legal costs they might incur defending and appealing such actions but also to alleviate some of the stress that people inevitably face when they find themselves in this situation.

As well as protection against the costs and stresses of vehicle cloning, Complete Motor Legal Solutions also covers policyholders against the cost of defending a motor prosecution (excluding driving while uninsured and drink, drugs, parking and mobile phone offences) and gives access to our Motoring Legal Services website.

To find out more about Complete Motor Legal Solutions, ask your ARAG account handler or call us on 0117 307 2278.

Disclaimer - all information in this article was correct at time of publishing.