The History Behind Car Insurance & The Protection It Provides

Vehicle insurance, and more particularly car insurance, is one of the most widely purchased types of insurance policies around the world today. How, did this whole concept of car insurance came into being? What is the history behind it? In this write up, we examine, what all were the ideas that played the foundation on which the whole concept of vehicular insurance is based.

The oldest documented proof of vehicular insurance can be traced back to the time when the west had started opening its doors to the Chinese. During the times when new colonies were being established along the Chinese coastal areas. A lot of transportation was done along the Pacific and Atlantic oceans from these areas through ships. These ships, containing cargo, would go haywire once in a while. In order to safeguard their ships against untoward incidents, the traders of those times rolled out insurance policies, thus giving air to the concept of vehicular insurance. The concept spread its wings in the coming years and today, the most important form of vehicular insurance is car insurance, as we know it today.

Later, the concept of car insurance got a whole new twist. Policy makers from all over the world got together and decided that owning a vehicle and driving it on public roads (roads, in most parts of the world are considered to be the property of the public) was a privilege.

Car insurance and the concept of vehicular insurance as such as been modified time and again since then. Policy makers from all over the world have had numerous meetings, focusing on the clauses in various car insurance policies. IN a span of more than 2 centuries, car insurance policies have come a long way, and continue to do so, even as you read this write up.

Policy makers from all over the world (especially those from the US) were bent on the fact that owning a vehicle and driving it on public property (roads are, by law, property of the public) is not a right, but a luxury and therefore, it became all the more important for car owners to get their vehicles insured. Car insurance was also deemed elementary to safeguard the interests of third parties who might get incur losses during an accident on the road.

Although, the first law making making car insurance mandatory for car owners in the US came as late as 1927, a lot had been done in this field. Policies pertaining to vehicular insurance came into being in the early 18th century and it was in 1898, that Dr. Truman J Martin rolled out the first car insurance policy that covered liabilities as well. This was not the first such policy in the world, though. In 1895, a British insurance company had done the same. With the number of cars in the world rising at a staggering rate, the number of road accidents has also increased manifold and laws pertaining to making car policies have been accepted all over the world with arms wide open.

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