FBC Explains How The Pay As You Drive (MyDrive) Insurance Service Works

So yesterday FBC announced a new insurance service, that I personally think is necessary. MyDrive, as they have coined it, is Zimbabwe’s first such service and it will see customers paying insurance on the basis of how often they drive their car and the mileage. On the surface, this sounds like a great way to get comprehensive insurance whilst saving on costs if, for example, you have a car that you drive far less often than another car you own.

I say on the surface because at the time of announcement we had not figured out how exactly this service will work in practice but we’ve been in communication with FBC and they answered the two questions we had concerning this new service.

TZ: How the packages for this service will be structured?

My Drive is an insurance package based on paying insurance based on the mileage the insured intends to travel in a year and our minimum mileage package is for 5,000km hence one can buy cover for any mileage above 5,000km.

My drive is designed to reward those who travel less km, have more than one vehicle or stay close to their workplace hence minimal usage of their vehicle. This is against traditional insurance that prices vehicles of the same value whose travelling habits are different i.e one with extensive use and a vehicle with minimal use are currently being priced the same.

TZ: Will there be a certain limit on kilometres per package over a certain period or customers will be billed after driving?

Customers who adopt My Drive will pre-purchase the Mileage with minimum Mileage being 5,000km. In the event that their cover or mileage is “running out”, clients can “top up” their insurance. FBC Insurance will use a telematics box that give feedback to the customer on the mileage they have travelled at any point in time.

The use of a telematics box -which is usually collected from GPS data, or the number of minutes the vehicle is being used as recorded by a vehicle-independent module transmitting data via cellphone or RF technology- will no doubt mean that the less you are using your car, the more the insurance company can monitor how much risk you’re reducing and thus factor that into your premium.