A new report by 'Young Africans for Opportunities' has shown that most motorists in Ghana sign on to vehicle insurance policies to avoid police harassment, and not necessarily to apply for claims in the unfortunate case of an accident.

The report titled “Driver Mo” revealed that 37%t of drivers purchase insurance policies because it is mandatory, while 32 percent do so to prevent police harassment.

To enable policy holders’ benefit, the report urged insurance companies to rebate long standing policy holders as an incentive to increase insurance coverage in Ghana.

By this, it explained that policy holders who do not make claims but continue to insure their vehicles for long periods must be given back some part of their monies.

The report further revealed that 63% of vehicle insurance policy holders feel cheated due to the decision of insurance companies not to rebate.

Speaking on the sidelines of the launch of the report, Project Lead for “Driver Mo”, Nathaniel Dwamena said “we realised that from the findings, majority of Ghanaians do not purchase the insurance because of the benefits rather. They just purchase insurance to avoid police harassment”.

“Majority also said they purchase insurance because it is mandated by laws and is compulsory. So the project sees the greater good in insurance serving more than compensating losses, but rather can be an incentive to improve safety and reduce accident,” he added.

He recommended that “drivers who have subscribed to insurance and have plied the road for about 20 years without accident can benefit from their insurance. If insurance companies have a system where such a driver will be given a rebate on their insurance. It serves as an incentive for them to practice better driving on the road. That is what we seek through this project”.

The National Insurance Commission lauded the report for revealing the gaps in the sector.

To address one of the challenges of dealing with fake stickers, Senior Manager at Marketing and External Relations of the Commission, Charles Ansong Dankyi indicated that his outfit will intensify education especially the use of the USSD code.

“The fake stickers, the MID is real time. It helps you to know whether a particular vehicle is insured or not. If a vehicle insurance has expired, and you even text it to the short code, it will pop up then you will know if it has expired or it doesn’t have insurance,” he said.

According to Driver Mo report, SIC Insurance Company is the most trusted vehicle insurance company among drivers.