One sure-fire way of lowering the costs of caravan insurance is the no-claims discount - along of course with making sure you compare caravan insurance online. Achieving this is the result of sensible and responsible preparation and driving on the part of the caravan owner.

With the credit crunch encouraging more people to consider caravan holidays this year, the Caravan Club have teamed up with the Driving Standards Agency to advise UK motorists to brush up on their driving and caravan towing skills before they hit the roads this summer.

The DSA’s Chief Driving Examiner, Trevor Wedge says: “Anyone who has not towed a caravan for a number of years should make sure they are familiar with any changes that may have taken place before they get in the driver’s seat. Handling, manoeuvring and vision is different for a driver when towing.”

The Caravan Club offer training courses for both motorhome and caravan drivers who want to refresh their skills before they set off on their summer holidays. Along with the DSA they highly recommend that drivers check a few things:

• If you passed your driving test before 1997, you are allowed to drive any car towing any caravan as long as the combined weight does not exceed 8250kg.
• If you passed your test after January 1997 then additional restrictions apply. You need to check these restrictions, and dependent upon the size of car or caravan you are driving or towing, you may have to take a further driving test.

Some further things you should consider is that over the years caravans have tended to become heavier, so you should make sure your car and caravan are a correct match. If they are not they could be unsafe and maybe even illegal. You should also make sure you are au fait with the technology features you have, for instance stability control systems.

Towing a caravan, if not sensibly undertaken, can be dangerous to yourself and to people around you. People towing caravans have a responsibility to ensure they have taken the necessary precautions to reduce this risk as much as possible. Courses like these, and forethought on behalf of people towing caravans go a long, long way to reducing that risk.

Tags: caravan, insurance, online

This entry was posted on Thursday, June 24th, 2010 at 11:28 am and is filed under Caravan Insurance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.