Are My Miles Restricted For My Black Box Policy?

When taking out a Young Driver insurance policy with Think Insurance there will be several things you are asked about. This information helps us calculate your Black Box insurance premium, and as part of this information collecting process we will ask you several things about you and your driving habits, including how many miles you intend to do for the duration of your Young Driver insurance policy.

The amount of miles you intend to do is an important part of the driving information collection process. Some of the other important information we will require when setting up your Telematics insurance policy includes your name, address, age, occupation, where the car is kept (when not being used), and what the car is used for (business, social, commuting), along with details of additional drivers on the policy. 

When you tell us how many miles you are going to do, you need to take into consideration what the car is used for. 

Social – If, whilst insured on our Young Driver insurance policy, you will only be using your car for social reasons then it’s likely your mileage will be quite low compared to most car drivers. Although, this may depend on where you live, and if you live in a rural area you may have got a car due to a lack of public transport options. This means your mileage may be higher than someone who lives in a more urban area of the country.

Commuting – If the main use of your car is commuting to and from work then you may find that you are going to use more miles than someone with a Black Box insurance policy that only has Social use. This will need to be taken in to consideration when trying to work out how many miles you think you will do over the year. 

You might not just commute to a place of work; your Commuting use may be for attending a place of higher education, such as a school sixth form, college or even university. It may be in addition to a work commitment too. Those commuting to a university often commute to a campus that isn’t located in their hometown but in a nearby city, as a way to reduce living costs by staying at home. University students living away from home looking for Car insurance may be interested in our Student Car insurance product, which is another form of our Black Box insurance.

Business Use – This is a different type of work use than Commuting. Someone that declares Business use on their Young Driver insurance policy will be using their car as part of their job, and this could be anything where they use the car to drive to more than one place of work. Usually if you have Business use on the policy you will be doing a lot more miles and this needs to be factored in.

How to properly calculate your Young Driver Insurance mileage

For many drivers who are in the process of taking out a Black Box insurance policy it may be your first time owning a car, and therefore you might have no idea how many miles you will need to buy. Working out what your car is used for, and how often it will be used can give you a good estimate to start from. We can help you with this, as our team of Young Driver specialists have dealt with thousands of young drivers who are unsure of how many miles they will need, and therefore we can help guide you in the right direction and make sure you have sufficient to cover your needs for the full term of the policy.

If you have already completed at least one year of driving, then you can look at your previous year’s mileage figure and see if that was correct. If that figure was higher or lower than expected, and nothing has changed in your personal circumstances in terms of car use, then it is best to go with the miles you actually drove last year. If things have changed, for example you will be going to a different educational institution, or you’re starting a new job in a few months which is further away from (or nearer to) where you live, then you should adjust your policy mileage to reflect this.

There will be some of you who may have underestimated how many miles you actually need, or your circumstances may have changed and your actual mileage might be greater than your initial forecast. If you are at risk of running out of miles on your policy, then you can buy additional mileage at any point in the policy to make sure you’re covered. You can see, via your online Dashboard, exactly how many miles you purchased and how many you have left, so as soon as you think you need more, you can contact our team and arrange for more miles to be added to the policy. If you look like you’re going to exceed your allowed mileage and we haven’t heard from you by certain points in the policy, then our team will also try and contact you to arrange for additional mileage. It’s important to note that if you exceed your allowed mileage without having contacted us and bought more miles, then your policy can be cancelled. The cost of additional mileage will also be based on your driving score up to the point of purchase and as such can be more expensive than if you’d bought a larger amount at the start of your policy.

To speak to a member of our team about mileage on a Telematics insurance policy, you can call us on 0800 221 8077. Or if you already know how many miles you will need and want to start the process right away, click ‘Get a Quote’ below.