What Is Fleet Motor Insurance?
Fleet insurance is simply a larger number of commercial vehicles insured under one policy; this can vary from insurer to insurer but generally ten vehicles is regarded as the minimum number for a fleet. A fleet policy normally has some extra benefits compared to a Commercial Motor policy so there are advantages in consolidating your vehicles under a fleet policy.
Conversely Commercial Motor Insurance will cover a reduced number of vehicles registered in the name of the business, and/or used to transport materials from point A to point B.
What Types of Coverage Are Available?
Commercial motor insurance tends to come in three common levels of coverage:
- Comprehensive cover both damage to your own vehicle as well damage imparted to other vehicles or property belonging to others
- third-party, fire and theft (TPF&T) – a more restricted cover & hence a cheaper alternative, which will still cover damage to your vehicle due to fire & theft as well as damage to other people’s property; note some insurers will restrict this cover to vehicles with a minimal value e.g. $5k
- third-party only (TPO) – the cheapest options as it only covers the damage your vehicle causes to other people (third party) property with no cover for damage to your own vehicle (although there are some exceptions to this).
There are other factors including optional benefits which can be tailored to suit the needs of your business including radius of trips undertaken, finance gap cover, free windscreen benefit, replacement vehicle benefit plus the option to go to the repairer of your choice.