VICTORIA — Solicitor-general Shirley Bond expressed concern Wednesday over a plan by the Insurance Corp. of B.C. to charge higher premiums to drivers with as little as one speeding ticket.
"I think I share the concerns that would imply that if you have a single speeding ticket you should be deemed a bad driver in British Columbia," Bond said Wednesday.
"I do believe that British Columbians think that if you are a better driver, potentially there should be bigger benefits. The questions is what is the definition of a bad driver and I think one speeding ticket is not appropriate?" she added.
Bond says she has already expressed her concern to officials at ICBC, and expects to meet with them about the proposal within the next week or so.
"It’s about the test of being reasonable," she said.
"I’m going to sit down and have a conversation with ICBC. My job is to make sure that I’m looking after what’s best for BC families."
Drivers who receive just one speeding ticket can expect to pay three years of higher insurance rates if the set of major changes being proposed by ICBC is approved.
Scheduled to take effect by 2014, the proposed changes would mean close to 30 per cent of all B.C. drivers – those with at least one of a variety of traffic-related convictions on their recent record – would pay higher premiums for their basic insurance.
The new program would cover a three-year history of convictions, the corporation says, and will be retroactive if it’s approved. That means violations collected today could mean higher rates once the system is in place.
But, ICBC says, the new system would also reward the estimated two-thirds of people in the province who have a clean, crash-free driving record by giving them cheaper rates.
In a wide-ranging interview with The Vancouver Sun on Tuesday, ICBC president and CEO Jon Schubert said the proposed changes are meant to more fairly reflect the risk each individual driver presents on the road.
“About 85 per cent of customers want us to use factors that will ensure that safer drivers receive a lower premium, and higher-risk drivers receive a higher premium,” said Schubert, adding the changes are largely meant to improve customer satisfaction.
“If we apply convictions in a greater way to our model, about two-thirds of our customers will see some kind of rate reduction, and about 30 per cent of our customers will see some slight increase in their premiums to better reflect their risk.”
Schubert could not say exactly how much more a driver would pay for insurance over the three years following a given infraction, or how much a driver could save for maintaining a clean record, saying that information is still being finalized.
However, Cindy Brown, ICBC vice-president of communications, said later the average saving for someone with a clean record would be about 10 per cent.
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