A bit more digging into the road safety poster seen in Leeds Bradford Airport, brought up Green Flags own campaign. But once again the year does not match but the time of year does.

It seems Green Flag had another road safety week in 2007 from 5th to 11th November, which is of course similar time that this post, but I could not find anything written about road safety week 2008. Maybe I am just not looking hard enough, but I did look under the road safety section of the Green Flag site.

You tube has several United Nations road safety campaign videos, but again I could not find any related to the Green Flag campaign. Just for the record here is the United Nations video.

After spending some time writing about Tesco breakdown cover it only seemed fair to take a look at the competition in the form of Asda breakdown cover.
The first thing you notice apart from the fact the policies are underwritten by the RAC, is that they have won the Your Money award for best online breakdown cover provider.

I found this confusing as Asda does not provide the breakdown cover service, the RAC does, so it was time to visit the Your Money website direct and read why Asda received this award. However this became even more confusion as the page with what we assume to be a list of awards just would not open on the night.

So for this blog post we cannot even link to the online breakdown cover award and at this point we still do not know what makes Asda better than the rest, even though the RAC provides the breakdown cover.

We will take you to the Your Money homepage and hopefully when you look, you will find why the medal is place on the Asda breakdown cover page

It has been a while since Breakdown Cover Net had a quick review of the pricing of the main roadside assistance polices available today from the 3 big suppliers and we can clearly see it is a competitive world.

Well here are the scores on the board on the 4th September 2008, advertised directly on the websites. (more…)

We reported on our last blog about how good it was to see the AA on TV campaigning for us motorists, but what we failed to mention, is that this breakdown cover organisation does report on motoring issues via its website.

The latest report dated the 1st September 2008, tells us about the stupid rules that are applied to us motorists and mirrors reports seen on the national news over the week.

The new press release by the AA is based on a guide by the Flexible Thinking Forum and is called “overcome Stupidity” and challenges stupid decisions, like yellow lines that are only a few inches long and would not apply to a full sized car. Bus lanes which go past business property, meaning anyone leaving should get a ticket. Another example is, charging for the, length of car in Norwich, irrelevant of carbon emission output.

There are many more examples found by breakdown cover net that have just not been thought through, and maybe are in place just to tax the motorist more. It is a shame that these reports are not just that bit more in your face. Of course selling breakdown cover and their insurance polices are the priority, so you have to specifically go looking for these press releases to show he work the AA are doing to promote motoring needs throughout the UK.

It is probably time that we here at breakdown cover Net, start going through previous press releases together with other motoring organisation and help spread the word.

Here is some exciting breakdown cover

The Green Flag has hit the screens with their now ageing “Boring Breakdown Cover” ad. No, that is what they call it, where different couples are stranded in their cars after breaking down and quite clearly the husbands had not bought breakdown cover from Green Flag. The adverts message is about speedy response times and the fact you can buy breakdown cover online for £25, which I have to admit is some deal. It seems that bring couples waiting a long time for another recovery service, lay with horns and sing songs to keep themselves occupied.
The problem is, I find the advert equally boring. It sets the scene well, but by making us feel bored, does that not make us switch off? Well it does me and I would rather see a toy Green Flag recovery vehicle jump over the Tower Bridge in London, than watch 2 boring couples.
(more…)

For generations even during the golden age of motoring there seemed to be a difference between the breakdown services options for personal use say for cars and that of commercial vehicles. The suggestion that van breakdown cover would become popular was not on the horizon as the adverts sent out a message about getting the stricken housewife who knows nothing about car mechanics home.

In reality though, the inconvenience of a motorist breaking down and cost implications of a commercial van breakdown could be miles apart. Think about the wages, the unhappy customer and the real threat of having the load stolen if the van is left unattended. If the breakdown was to happen on the way home, is there overtime involved and that unhappy customer, was there more custom to come from them.

So keeping that van on the road really could eat into the business pocket, not to mention the insurance issues involved. This is not meant to scare but more like a realisation of the needs of the business owner and why van breakdown cover has become more popular and how the service providers have adapted or should I say added to their policies and agreements to keep the businesses on the road.

Commercial vehicle policies are available from most providers now and in many cases the costs versus the rewards or can be a no brainer for the companies concerned. Call out times under 1 hour and even recovery to anywhere in the mainland could save serious money in this competitive world.

There was a lively discussion the other day between myself and a friend talking about where breakdown cover services will go in the future. It started with the huge rise in petrol costs that eventually will have an impact on what fuel we may choose in future years. Take the current hybrid cars, the Toyota being the most popular at the moment. What would the chances be that a breakdown could be caused by an electrical motor fault rather than a fuelled engine?
Well maybe not so high at the moment, it as hybrid cars are becoming more popular it only makes sense that eventually the fuel driven options will be reduced and electrical increased, meaning the breakdown cover patrol guys will probably need a new set of skills.
(more…)

It doesn’t matter what you watch, what you read the news of the day, month and possibly year is the credit crunch that is going to take away our homes and reduce our pensions. It doesn’t matter about the typhoon in Burma or the earthquake in China the credit crunch is here and everyone is going to be broke.
This obviously affects our buying habits and products or services we don’t need start getting put on the shelf. An example of this is breakdown cover, yes it is an insurance policy, but no, it is not compulsory by law and it is very easy to assume that next year your car, bike or van will not have a mechanical failure whilst on the road. (more…)

The competition for breakdown cover is fierce with every organisation trying to one better on the competition to get those extra sales. At the moment, you still can get a Green Flag breakdown cover policy for £25 online, which is amazing value and clearly is this price to get the quanities in.

Here is a video od a more extreme service that many motorists may want ot have in the future, although highly unlikely, how to get rid of other motorists on the road that get in your way. The ironic thing about this, is that the other guy will need the breakdown cover man also after the event. You will get the point when you watch this video.