lane departure etc..

What does your insurance company think about turning a safety feature off?

I noticed that when I insured my PRIUS, it listed the safety features which the car has, which, I would assume are taken into account in setting the premium.

 

We're not required to tell them what we choose to use in our vehicles. The event data recorder (EDR) information may be used in the event of an accident, but beyond the required (by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)) captured data, each vehicle manufacturer's EDR may include additional data points. Is the LDA on/off condition is one of those data points? Beats me, and I'm not concerned if it is...

 

In the U.S., the insurance company uses the VIN, which identifies all of the safety equipment in the vehicle, to set the premiums, amongst the other non-vehicle information (e.g., driver's history, how will the vehicle be used, whether parked on the street or not, address or zip code it is registered to, etc.)

 

They do seem to take safety systems into account. My insurance did increase from the 08' gen 2 to the 2017 Prius 2, but only about $120.00/year. I'm sure they have statistics on safety system equipped vehicles and claim costs vs non-equipped vehicles.

 

That and and the increased cost of more expensive repairs, I'd expect.

 

I look on it - they look for any excuse to deny an insurance claim. I think of if I was had a write-off situation, Mine PLUS the Bentley in the next lane, was proven to have LDA OFF - either by software interrogation or by the simple fact that my car wandered when they know full well that my car will have 1) alerted me; and 2) assisted me - so I keep it on.

Yes, they'll look for any excuse. My Dad had a minor accident a while back where he reversed into a car (mine!!!) as he exited his driveway. He got quotes, submitted it to insurance, they sent an assessor to his home. The assessor didn't even look at the damage, but carefully looked at all 4 tyres to check they were legal. Dad told him "here's the damage" - "no, just checking the vehicle is roadworthy". I suspect a tyre with less than legal tread would have voided the accident claim.

 

That is unbelievably petty, did they check the tyre pressures and do an MOT test (or AU equivalent) and what would they do if he had just fitted brand new tyres that day, rebuke his claim ?

 

Standard practise here, I believe, though I try not to have accidents, so can't vouch for it every time. And clearly part of my current insurance policy conditions:



I wouldn't like to have to challenge their decision about refusing my claim after turning off LDA in a courtroom.

 

The last two claims SWMBO and myself made (minor incidents and a few years ago), they didn't send any assessors out. In both cases, we informed the insurers of the incident, filled out the claim forms and they sent the repairer out to take the car and fix it.
I could understand if the insurers were paying out major sums for a written off vehicle or injury claims, but to check the vehicle for roadworthiness in your circumstances, makes me think the insurers are amateurs as are their assessors.

 

Or, perhaps they are working the wriggle-room escape clause.

 

Definitely so, which is why I would not trust companies like those to insure me or my property, the same reason I always insure with well known big brand companies that have a good reputation and reviews.

 

I quizzed a friend who is an assessor - he said that it's worth it for them to check even small claims - he said there was a big enough proportion of unroadworthy vehicles to m

Mine is (and Dad's was at the time) with one of the 10 largest Insurance Companies in the world.

 

All these sound ques and alerts are more annoying (to me) then they are of use...wish there's an option to take a $1k-2k discount for dealer to not even have them installed or to take them out of the car.

***don't have them on the prius, but got them on the odyssey (different safety names, same mumbojumbo)...I can turn off the lane departure warning, but the forward collision warning is just useless and an annoyance (and as stated above could be a grounds for insurance companies to put blame more and more on drivers), it goes off on some way too sensitive calculated speed formula and whatever obstacle/car may be in front of you. Only new safety feature(s) that are good seem to be all the cameras that mfg's are adding and that birds eye view camera that some cars have.

 

Even worse, the full screen MID popups for non-critical data could very well leade to a distracted driving accident. The most annoying cruise control alerts cannot be turned off. It is not critical I know whether rise control sees a car in front of me.They could have easily resedigned the HSI display and left a space at the top for non-critical information.

 

Here's a picture of the active grill shutter assembly. These close at higher speeds from what I recall reading. The small grill vents near the Toyota logo are always open.

Prius_shutter by CoolPrius posted Dec 28, 2017 at 1:38 PM

 

Here is the Toyota Canada video from another thread.

 

I've been driving my new Prius for 5 days now and the LDA appears in my HUD. It has beeped a warning to me a couple of times. I like it because it just keeps me more alert as a driver. For me it is like a hey pay attention.

 

That's exactly what it is! A slight bonus is the faint nudge to correct the steering. In truth, my wife is far more aggressive in correcting my errors, but hey ho!

 

If only they would beep instead of shouting though.

 

It's great for blind drivers isn't it.