Interactive: how car insurance has gone up for people like you Citywire.co.uk
Car insurance premiums are going through the sunroofThe cost of car insurance has increased at a phenomenal rate in the last couple of years.
If you are a 17 year old male you could be looking at an average bill of nearly £3,000 a year – compared to less than two thirds of this just 18 months ago.
And it's not just the supposedly 'high risk' groups that have been affected by rising premiums. If you're a 40 – 49 year old woman your average annual car insurance premium has increased by a huge 40% to £595 since January 2010.
Insurers blame rising premiums on the burden of uninsured drivers, fraud and increased personal injury claims. Yet just today Admiral, which also owns Confused.com, Elephant.co.uk and Diamond, reported a 27% rise in pre-tax profits in the first half of 2011 thanks in large part to rising car insurance premiums.
Worryingly, a recent European Court of Justice ruling stating that insurers can no longer charge men and women different premiums means that costs are likely to soon soar even further for female drivers. And despite the AA's claims that premiums fell slightly for young drivers earlier this year and increased at a 'slower rate' for everyone else, for most people these sorts of prices are simply unaffordable.
