Insurance discount with Sat Nav

[davidsl500]

I've heard that some insurance companies favour Sat Nav's and therefore reduced premiums can be had.

Can't see how that works, they seem to be a liability to me. Like the guy messing with his as he rear ended the car in front - I could see him clearly take his eyes off the road to fiddle with it as we all (apart from him!) came to a sudden stop.....

The windscreen mounted add ons seem to be the worse, driving home tonight the glare off the guys sat nav through his rear window and into my eyes was very distracting - how he could see where he was going beats me.......

 

[television]

Never heard of a discount,but with the other observations the Navman and the Command do not let you fiddle while driving, you have to stop the car to make any adjustments. The command also auto dims at a low ambient light level and if you do not want that you can turn the screen off and just use the info in the cluster and the voice instructions.
With the Navman you can dim the thing when driving, fiddly when mounted on the screen as it moves or can come unstuck.
I think that any thing as heavy as these things could be a hazard in the event of an accident flying around the car.
I know many people do not like the Command, but its always there,and will get you where you want to go as any of the others.

iI learnt my lesson some years ago about being distracted by these things when I had a little colour portable TV, living in a poor reception area I had it on the seat to reverse up the drive to get a beter signal while watching the screen I reversed into a flint wall that destroyed the rear tyre.

Malcolm

 

[124coupe]

Comand allows full fiddling while driving!

 

[Rory]

I might have dreamed this, but I think COMAND input while the vehicle is moving is disabled in some countries (like Netherlands?).

I know it's wrong, but I hardly ever set mine before moving off - I always think I'll wait until I get stopped at traffic lights or whatever. It's hard to deny that messing about with zoom levels etc isn't distracting.

If discounts are available then I've not heard of them. They arguably make the car more of a theft target, which would seem to work against possible premium savings.

 

[124coupe]

In the case of Comand they also make the car £2000 more expensive as a write-off so I doubt a discount would be given...

You are right re the Netherlands option - it was in the same "driver distraction" menu as the DVD-on-the-move options - now disabled in the current software.

 

[OmniCognateNeutronRangler]

I think all after market sat nav system are set up by default so that you can't fiddle whilst driving. However, I believe they also have a setting that overrides this. Mine certainly does. It warns you against doing it but lets you do it anyway.

As for the glare thing, I have mine set to a very low brighness setting. it also automatically adjusts itself when it gets dark (based on the time, not a light sensor) so it doesn't dazzle. Trouble is too many people just slap them on the windscreen without actually setting them up properly to make them more usable.