Geographical influence on car insurance premium prices
Breaking down the overall driving convictions data we take a more detailed look at the drink and drug related offences.
Of the 3.4 million recorded offences on drivers' insurance quotations, 147,000 or 4.3 per cent were for a drink or drug-related conviction.
Analysis of the data by geographic location shows that the highest proportion of drink or drugs-related convictions per quote is in South Wales with 6.7 convictions per 1,000 quotations, followed by North Scotland at 6.4 and Mid Wales at 5.9. If we drill down to the actual postal areas of the UK with the highest proportion of claims per 1,000 quotes, we can see that the top 10 and lowest 10 places for drink or drug related driving offences are:
Delving deeper into the data shows the postal towns with the highest and lowest amount of offences in the UK:
Highest Amount of Offences
| Rank |
Postal Town & Postcode Area |
Rate per 1000 |
| 1 |
Harrogate |
HG |
8.2 |
| 2 |
Hereford |
HR |
7.3 |
| 3 |
Cardiff |
CF |
7.2 |
| 4 |
Blackpool |
FY |
6.8 |
| 5 |
Truro |
TR |
6.7 |
| 6 |
Dundee |
DD |
6.6 |
| 7 |
Carlisle |
CA |
6.6 |
| 8 |
Swansea |
SA |
6.6 |
| 9 |
Inverness |
IV |
6.6 |
| 10 |
Cleveland |
TS |
6.4 |
Lowest Amount of Offences
| Rank |
Postal Town & Postcode Area |
Rate per 1000 |
| 1 |
London E |
E |
2.6 |
| 2 |
London N |
N |
2.8 |
| 3 |
Bradford |
BD |
2.9 |
| 4 |
Ilford |
IG |
3.0 |
| 5 |
London W |
W |
3.2 |
| 6 |
Oldham |
OL |
3.4 |
| 7 |
Liverpool |
L |
3.5 |
| 8 |
Bolton |
BL |
3.6 |
| 9 |
London NW |
NW |
3.6 |
| 10 |
London SE |
SE |
3.7 |
Further analysis looked at the professions with higher proportions of drink-drive convictions. We found that the top 10 with the higher number of drink drive convictions tended to be manual/blue - collar workers. Also listed below are the bottom 10 professions.
Highest Amount of Offences
| Profession |
Rate per 1000 |
| Scaffolder |
22.5 |
| Roofer |
18.9 |
| Ground Worker |
18.7 |
| Labourer |
18.0 |
| Bricklayer |
18.0 |
| Oil Rig Crew |
18.0 |
| Steel Worker |
16.5 |
| Construction Worker |
15.9 |
| Builders Labourer |
15.9 |
| Soldier or Royal Marine |
15.5 |
Lowest Amount of Offences
| Profession |
Rate per 1000 |
| School Student |
0.17 |
| Paramedic |
0.20 |
| Driving Instructor |
0.50 |
| Police Officer |
0.53 |
| District Nurse |
0.56 |
| Scientist |
0.64 |
| Taxi Driver |
0.66 |
| Child Minder |
0.75 |
| Minister of Religion |
0.86 |
| Veterinary Assistant |
0.93 |
Comment:
Kevin Pratt, insurance expert at MoneySupermarket commented:
“The data shows that there are pockets of society that have a higher proportion of drink-drive convictions than others. It might not be surprising to see that this is largely male dominated and the professions with the higher proportion of claims are therefore skewed towards more male-dominated, blue- collar work forces.
"However, this also highlights that more needs to be done to raise awareness to these particular drivers to help them reduce the number of claims they have. Not only does drink-driving have huge personal and emotional consequences in extreme cases, but having a conviction on your licence brings financial repercussions and means paying more for your cover, or in some cases being refused insurance altogether.”