The Adjusted Normal, 57. Pay Up or Walk.

This morning, I had to take my daughter to a doctor's appointment for a physical for her new job. Because of the devil virus, I couldn't wait in the waiting room with her and had to wander outside on the streets. 

As I started wandering around, I decided to go to the insurance office where our cars have their insurance policies. I just wanted to assure myself that there would be no problem with our daughter taking the car to work every day, since she has just gotten her license.

I went in, explained, asked if she was covered under our policies, and the woman looked at me and said, No.

Uh oh. But, if she was a household driver, like my husband and I, surely it didn't matter if she drove the car. Would it?

Yes, it mattered. It mattered to the insurance company. Because she is a novel driver, we have to pay a supplement for her. I sighed. How much? From five hundred on up. My jaw dropped. I think our yearly policies on each of our two cars barely reach three hundred. The woman explained that insurance companies can sometimes cover small accidents caused by novel drivers, but they are within their rights to turn around and charge the takers of the insurance every cent the company has spent. She told me she would look into it and negotiate a price for me with the insurance company.

I left, shaken. And angry. Years ago, it was common for a parent to buy their newly licensed child a used car, and put the insurance in the parent's name so the price wouldn't be astronomical (we're talking upwards of a yearly thousand euros on a second hand car if the taker is inexperienced). Insurance companies seem to have gotten wise to that, and now there's no way out. Either pay a supplement for drivers under 25 or with less than five years experience, or face enormous, bankrupting bills if there's a bad accident.

Not only is it practically white-gloved robbery, it hampers young people's opportunities to become independent. Our daughter wants to devote this winter to working to save money to further her studies. But, she needs a license to be able to get to work, otherwise I would have had to drive her. She needs to take one of our cars, because we can't buy her one, and that car needs insurance by law. If she were on her own without us behind her, she could neither afford a car nor insurance. And that would be her lot until she's 28 (when she acquires five years experience). And then we complain that Spain is one of the European nations with the most young people living with their parents well into their thirties. I wonder why (sarcasm to the maximum).

Life continues.