If your car is parked for days/weeks/months at a time, it doesn’t really make sense to be paying for accident cover, right? Right! Well we’ve introduced a special feature for just such an occasion.
The difference between your car and Schrödinger's Cat
Like the famous thought experiment of Schrödinger's Cat, some things will only be revealed once you open the box — figuratively speaking. You won’t know if the milk is truly off until you open the carton. Until you open the oven to take out your cake, you are both an at-home-amateur and a Masterchef.
But your car does not conform to this physics experiment. When you’re not driving it, there is no chance of you having an accident. It simply cannot happen. There is no mystery. No debate.
So why then do you have to pay for accident cover?
At Naked, we believe you should only pay for the cover you need and that is why we created CoverPause®. It’s a feature on our app that allows you to pause your accident cover instantly when you won’t be needing it. All you need to do is tap ‘Pause accident cover’ when you know your car will be parked for more than a day.
So, for example, if you’re paying R600 per month for full comprehensive cover and you pause your accident cover while it’s parked in the garage or in an airport parking bay, your premium will decrease to around R300 per month (billed pro rata) for that time. Of course, you’re still covered for absolutely anything that can happen to the car while it is parked: flood, fire, theft, the roof falling in, the cat scratching the leather seats — all of it. But don’t forget when you do get behind the wheel again, just tap ‘Resume accident cover’.
Why people love pressing the Pause button
Prior to the COVID-19 lockdown we saw our customers hit the pause button many times for different reasons. Some of them parked their car at the airport whilst they were away for a weekend or on an overseas holiday. Others, fortunate enough to have a weekend car, only resumed their accident cover whenever they wanted to take their baby for a spin. We even got feedback from avid business travellers who flew locally or internationally and couples who had two cars but only used one the majority of the time.
But since the start of the Coronavirus pandemic, we — not only as a country but together with the rest of the world - have had to look for new ways to support people through this crisis. We are fortunate that our tech and AI have allowed us to carry on business as usual. But we know that for a lot of people, this isn’t the case. With the majority of us at home with our car keys hung up and cars parked in the garage, we realised that we could reduce the premiums even further when people use CoverPause. In The benefits of being Naked during lockdown we summarised why we decided to let the Naked tribe reduce their car insurance premiums by ±90% for the days they aren’t driving during the Covid crisis. After the completion of the level 5 lockdown, we also evaluated the use of CoverPause over the full 35-day period.
Whatever the future holds
However long COVID-19 affects people’s travel habits, there will increasingly be periods - days, even weeks or months - that cars are just standing at home.
We can’t say for sure whether Schrödinger’s cat is dead or alive, but one thing is certain: you can save on insurance when your car is standing still.
