Vehicle Camera Systems UK

As they become increasingly congested the UK’s roads are becoming dangerous places to be, and drivers need to be as careful as possible. But being careful sometimes isn’t sufficient and it helps to have a few helpful tools up your sleeve too, and that is where vehicle cameras can come in handy.

According to the UK’s Insurance Fraud Bureau (IFB), so-called Cash for Crash scams accost the insurance industry more than £340 million in unnecessary payouts last year alone, and that costs us all money. 

These types of scams, in which are orchestrated by fraudsters who manufacture collisions, usually with innocent road users, with the intent of profiting from fraudulent insurance claims. Typically, the fraudster will apply the brakes to their vehicle hard in front of an unsuspecting driver, who is usually slow to react and collides with the rear of the fraudster’s car. Since any rear-end shunt is legally seen as the fault of the person behind – they should be paying attention and maintaining a safe distance – the fraudster generally gets a good pay-day, particularly if they can claim that they have suffered a personal injury such as a whiplash too. Those can be milked to elicit thousands of pounds in compensation. And the otherwise innocent driver may receive a criminal penalty and the likelihood of much higher insurance premiums in the future.

It is so easy to get scammed that drivers have to take as many precautions as possible. They should always be vigilant and take extra care when driving around cities and other built-up areas – the most likely place to get scammed – but one of the best ways to protect is to get a vehicle camera system.

Having a camera running in your vehicle is an ideal way to record what is happening in front of you and prove that you have been set up. You may think that if you collide with the back of a car in front of you, it is a done deal, but actually, there are several ways that you can spot if you are being scammed. 

If you have been involved in an accident and have a camera, when you get out of the vehicle, leave your ignition switched on. This will ensure that the camera remains to record. Get out and try to stand in front of your car to talk to the other driver. If they are a scammer, there will be several tell-tale signs:

• The other driver is far too calm for someone that's been involved in a car accident and is keen to assign blame. 
• They give an unlikely reason for braking very sharply.
• They have already written down their insurance details ready to give you before the accident happened
• Any injuries appear to be completely at odds with the force of the impact, and typically involve a whiplash injury.

If you can get any of these reactions down on video then you stand a reasonable chance of proving that the accident is a Crash for Cash scam. Furthermore, you will have the footage from your vehicle camera system to back you up. 

Insurance companies are far more suspicious of shunt-types accidents than ever before and will always look for evidence that there is a scam going on. If you have dashcam cam footage, then that could go a long way towards proving that you are being set up.

And vehicle camera systems can go a long way to helping prevent thefts or vandalism to your car too. Modern camera systems can be made to come to life if the car suffers some kind of shocks such as a door being forced or some kind of damage being inflicted upon it. At that point, the cameras will start running and are likely to capture images of the people responsible, giving you something to take to the police and your insurance company.

Vehicle camera systems make sense for several different reasons, and not have one will leave you exposed from several angles. Get one today!