Two Wheeler Insurance: Tips to Choose the Best One

Bertolt Brecht, the famous German Poet and Theatre Personality, once quoted, “When the praying does no good, Insurance does help.” Insurance is a big term. Insurance is trust. Insurance is hope. You tend to insure your well being every single second through every single action of ours. You have spent your childhood studying and preparing yourselves for all the challenges of your life because you wanted to insure our happy life. You lead a disciplined active life so that you can insure a healthy life. In short, insurance is one word that is entwined with our lives, just like a climber interweaves the bark of a tree.

What is Insurance?

You tend to insure everything precious to us, including our lives, homes, and even our children. You insure their safety and happiness in numerous ways. Among them, the most tangible and quantified way of insuring their safety is when you purchase dedicated insurance to safeguard their well-being. Yes! You are talking about financial insurance plans. Financially, insurance is defined as a legal agreement between two parties – Insurer and Insured. Usually, an Insurer is a dedicated insurance company that promises to take care of the losses, if any, in case of any eventuality (as specified in the insurance documents) or contingency (accidental incidents leading to losses) that the insured faces. Insured is an individual who wishes to insure and protect their prized possessions in lieu of Premium’s financial consideration (as decided and defined by the insurer).

What is Two Wheeler Insurance?

Our lives are important. It is the primary reason you insure our life, the life of our family members, and even our houses. On the same note, you also need to insure our vehicles. Vehicles have an important role in our lives. While our lives are getting stressful and competitive, speed is one aspect that differentiates us. Vehicles give us speed, though you are not supposed to drive our vehicles at very high speed. Here the word speed indicates having wheels under your feet to gain speed in the work you do and how you do it. Vehicles and improved means of transportation have surely enhanced and upgraded how you lead our lives. However, increased use of vehicles has also increased the risk of our lives. You are always at risk whenever you are out of home, given the number of accidents every day. Therefore, motor vehicle insurance becomes mandatory. The Government of India has made it mandatory to carry a valid copy of the Motor Vehicle Insurance certificate while driving on the road. Motor Vehicle Insurance covers all kinds of motor vehicles, including four-wheelers and two-wheelers.

Two-wheeler insurance is also known as Bike insurance. Bikes or two-wheelers are a constant companion for a considerably large population in India. In the cities, bikes or two-wheelers are also popular in small towns and rural areas. Bikes are the preferred mode of transportation in these places, given the nature of roads. Cars or four-wheelers usually require pucca roads and require considerably higher investments, thus further increasing the popularity of bikes in these areas. Two Wheeler insurance is an insurance policy (mandatory under the Motor Vehicle Act in India) to protect your two-wheeler against any damages due to accidents, theft, natural disasters, or any other serious incident.

Why is Two Wheeler Insurance Important?

Your Two Wheeler is your constant companion in your journey of life. Therefore, you have the responsibility to protect both – your life and your bike. Some reasons why your two-wheeler insurance is important to include:

• Your two-wheeler is insured against any accident. Minor accidents and damages to your bike can thus be repaired without taxing your pocket. Cashless Repairs at the reputed garages across the towns and cities would not be a problem anymore!
• Your two-wheeler is insured against any natural disaster. Therefore, any damage or loss of your vehicle during such a natural disaster would thus be covered.
• Your two-wheeler is insured against theft. Thus, in case your bike is stolen, you have something to bank upon.
• Your two-wheeler insurance also includes any losses caused to any third party. Therefore, in case of accidents where any third party gets injured would also be covered and taken care of under the same insurance policy.
• In case you don’t claim any insurance for a stipulated time, you are also eligible to earn your No-Claim Bonus!

Therefore, to continue your stress-free journey in life, you need to have the mandatory two-wheeler insurance by your side.

Tips to Choose the Best Two Wheeler Insurance

Some points that should be understood before choosing the optimum Two Wheeler Insurance for your bike include:

• Type of Coverage Required: Usually, Two Wheeler insurances are of two types:
  • Comprehensive Coverage – A comprehensive insurance coverage would include all kinds of insurance, including insurance covering your two-wheeler against the impact of any damage due to accident, damages due to fire, theft of the bike, or damage or loss due to an earthquake. The comprehensive insurance would also cover any third party liability, including the death of any person/s, physical injury of any person/s, and/or any damage to third party property.
  • Insurance policies providing Third-Party Coverage only – As against the comprehensive coverage, insurances involving only third party coverage restrict the coverage to any damage caused to other vehicles and their passengers due to your two-wheelers only.

While third party coverage is mandatory, comprehensive insurance coverage gives you overall mental peace. Choose the right type of insurance coverage depending upon your two-wheeler usage pattern. Your overall expenditure (usually, comprehensive coverage premiums is cheaper than the third party coverage premiums), and other liabilities.

• Cubic Capacity of your Bike: This is the determining factor for deciding your Premium. Yes! Your two-wheeler insurance premium is decided upon the cubic capacity of your bike. The higher the cubic capacity, the higher would be the Premium.
• Choosing the right insurer: It is important to choose the right partner for your insurance, or else you might face a problem during your claim settlement process. Researching on the claim settlement ratio of any insurance company would be a good measure to determine the company’s efficiency.
• Comparing the insurance policies online: Technology has been a boon. Various websites help us compare two wheeler insurance policies provided by multiple insurers online. You should not only check the difference in Premium (which might not be significant) but the features such as claim settlement process, online customer care support, riders available for extension of insurance coverage, process, and ease of coverage renewal periodically, among others.

Insuring your two wheeler is mandatory under the Motor Vehicles Act. More than that, it is your responsibility to keep yourself stress-free and mentally relaxed while you ride your two-wheeler. Therefore, choosing the right insurance company and the best insurance policy would be the right step towards your stress-free journey ahead!