Many breakdown insurance policies don’t cover misfuelling

New research has revealed that as many as 23% of breakdown policies in the UK don’t cover accidental misfuelling. On top of this a further 14% of motor insurance policies don’t cover motorists if they run out of fuel while out on the road. Filling a car with the wrong type of fuel can have many costly consequences. Not only will the driver have to fork out for repairs to the car, but in most cases they’ll also have to pay to have the vehicle towed to a garage to have the damage repaired. The failure to cover misfuelling is particularly worrying as the problem occurs fairly regularly with 100,000 incidents of the wrong fuel being put in cars in the UK last year alone. New drivers are particularly at risk of accidentally filling their cars with the wrong kind of fuel as they are less familiar with their vehicle and also the colour coded petrol pump system. For this reason, experts are advising that new drivers ensure they are covered for misfuelling by their breakdown insurer in case the worst does happen. The statistics were presented by independent research group Defaqto who also found that some motor insurance providers are charging drivers up to £85 to cancel their policies early.