Adding Named Drivers to Car Insurance: Costs, No Claims & More

If your child has just passed their driving test, adding them as a named driver to your car insurance policy can help them save money on the cost of cover.

A named driver on your car insurance will have the same level of cover as you. They’ll be able to drive your car whenever they want. But a major stipulation is that they cannot drive the car more often than you. You must continue to be the car’s main driver.

You can read our full guide to the rules for named drivers.

In this post we’ll discuss how much it might cost you to add a driver to your car insurance.

Your child has just passed their driving test, and you want to let them drive your car – when they’re home from university, for example.
You and another person share a car but one of you drives more than the other. In this case, the person who drives the car the most would be the main policyholder, while the other would be a named driver.
You’re planning a road trip, and you want to share driving duties while travelling long distances.

Adding a driver to your car insurance will affect the price of the premiums you pay. It all depends on whether your insurer considers your named driver to be a high-risk driver or a low-risk driver. If you add a named driver who’s younger and less experienced than you, it will likely drive up the price of your premiums.

If you add a named driver to your policy who’s older and more experienced than you, then it may in some circumstances bring down the cost of your cover – especially if the named driver’s never been involved in an accident before. This is because having more experience behind the wheel can result in a lower chance of an accident. However, named drivers should be using the vehicle on a regular basis.

Adding your child to your car insurance policy will almost certainly raise the cost of your cover, as they’ll be a lot less experienced than you. It’s hard to say how much it might affect your premiums but adding them to your policy maybe cheaper than if they were to purchase their own independent car insurance policy.

You could ask the named driver on your policy to pay you for the increase. That way, you’d end up paying the same as you always did for your insurance, and they’d get the cover they need, for less.

Adding a named driver to your policy could affect your no claims discount. If they are ever involved in an accident while driving your car, all of the risk will be passed on to you, as the policyholder. This means your no claim bonus could be impacted, even if you weren’t driving the car at the time of the accident.

Also, for as long as the named driver is on your policy, they won’t be building up a no claims bonus of their own. So, when the time finally comes for them to get their own car insurance policy, they may have to pay more for cover than they would have done otherwise – even if they’ve by now been driving for years without incident.