Just saw the newsflash on BBC – the EU has ruled that gender CANNOT be taken into account when calculating insurance premiums.
It will apply from 1 December 2012.
I’ll edit this post as the story comes through properly.
OK, here’s the first BBC report about it.
Some of the comments are interesting – and laughable. This one from someone called ‘compliancegeek’ especially so:
What a ludicrous ruling. How can insurers effectively price risk and how can consumers get a fair deal if insurers can’t take critical factors into account? It’s like saying a 60 year old driver with a perfect no claims record should pay the same a 17 year old new driver!!
Indeed, most of the comments seem to make an automatic connection with age. Oh, and bananas, of course. They’re simply incapable of looking at this logically (and this seems especially true of all the indignant women out there).
New drivers are ALL capable of having accidents – men AND women. Those who have them will see their insurance skyrocket (in the true sense of the word). People really need to stop pretending to themselves that women don’t have accidents or drive like idiots. Some of them do, and that’s why they should be paying the same premiums as everyone else.
Likewise, not ALL young males have accidents – it’s just as “unfair” to sting them with higher premiums as it apparently is to sting women with them. A uniform approach is the answer.
With age comes experience – and lower premiums.