Advice On Insurance Following My Bike Being Stolen

Tracking devices are very, very easy to jam. Use a VPN and search Google (they filter them out on UK Google sites) , it will return lots of jammers that can be bought, principally from China, but there are European resellers too.
My company went through a period of tracking company vehicles. A few of us drivers were less than happy with that and bought jammers, which we would switch on and off to 'disappear'. I still have two of them. Ultimately the company lost interest and stopped the policy.
The downside is for the user, they also block GPS and phone signals, so using when driving was OK as long as you knew where to go.
All tracking systems need to know where they are. If the GPS is blocked, they cant know.
Every vehicle thief with even half a brain knows this.
On insurance, if the bike was stolen from home and you have not improved security substantially, I guess you are more of a risk now. Your best bet is using one of the compare sites and putting in the details of your recent claim. You may find that you can get insured, but it will be several times higher than before.
The worse news is that a total loss claim will also spill into any other vehicle insurance you may have. Don't tell them, and look to claim - if they spot the omission (as they do) and they will not pay out.

 

I have had this problem, my car was stolen last year and the knock effect on my insurance has been substantial. My car insurance quadrupled and my bike insurance doubled despite it having nothing to do with my bike riding licence etc.

This situation lasts for three years so I have the same to come for a couple of years yet.

Don't be tempted not to mention it as it's almost certain your details will be on the insurance company's database and any misrepresentation may make it worse.

I had protected no claims bonus but that didn't make much difference, the only good thing was that my insurance company gave me a month to insure another car with them and then they would continue my current insurance until expiry which gave me a few months at what was then my normal rate.

Have you tried Adrian Flux they were the cheapest when it came to the time when I did have to reinsure my bike for the coming year. Their rate was substantially more affordable than any of the bigger bike insurers

 

Jesus, what a pain… OP has my sympathy. And what a bike to have nicked! Sickening.

Underwriters over the past few years have become more and more risk averse. The way policies have rocketed is ridiculous. Years of claimant piss taking (whiplash, crash for cash, wrist lash etc.) and here we are. Genuine end users taking a bumming.

There’s no good solution really. You either take the hit with significantly increased insurance premiums going forwards or you forgo nice things. Tragic…

 

Can’t be much help except to suggest another insurance company…I’m with Hastings direct with 6 points on my card , easily the cheapest I found and not MCE.
Good luck

 

What a PITA, sorry for your troubles. However, this part concerns me

1. I always believed BikeTrac (AllTrac) had 2 methods of tracking a vehicle, via satellite and via radio waves. If this isn’t the case and if it’s as easy to source a GPS signal jammer as it appears it is then this makes the entire AllTrac service redundant.

2. However, if it were me I’d be following up on the fact you didn’t receive an alert from them. In the first instance I’d write/email them requesting copies of their data for your vehicle for the 24hr period surrounding the theft, complete with records of their actions, if any, with regards to the noticed movement of the vehicle. If, as you say, they failed in their duty to alert you (or the police or whatever security company they use to pursue stolen vehicles) and, as it appears, they failed to further react when the satellite signal stopped being received, you may have a case to sue them for negligence. However, you’d have to demonstrate your loss, which, as you’ve been recompensed for the bike, is just the increased premiums going forwards, which as a contingent loss may be harder to pursue. That being said, I imagine AllTrac wouldn’t want to be publicly outed as having a system which can, apparently, be so easily circumvented and may make a significant gesture of goodwill to you which will help with future insurance premiums.

 

I was always under the impression that the radio aspect of Biketrac was for relatively local tracking for their operatives or the police (as if they really care any more), with suitable equipment, to locate vehicles from their last known position. Really in case they've been parked in underground car parks etc. or are out of sight locked in a van or shipping container, especially where there are a numerous possibilities at the location. There are videos on YouTube of this sort of 'final mile' tracking.



If the tracker is jammed from the point of theft, or another location, and then moved elsewhere the asset is lost as they can't get close enough to get an RF fix.

I'm somewhat sceptical from my experience that Biketrac are a victim of their own success. Not sure if the service depicted in the above video is available to all subscribers, maybe something you have to pay extra for. The video is from ten years ago. Their phone call on movement service seems to have stopped for mine, I now just get a text and email. Maybe I reached a threshold of false alarms on moving the bike with the ignition off, I did do that on occasion. This hasn't stopped me having the unit from my old 1260s Multi fitted to the Pikes Peak though, have had notified Biketrac of the change.

Using the tracker, when fitted to my 1260s, I was alerted when it was picked up and subsequently followed my bike around France on the back of a recovery truck after my recent accident. Oddly enough the tracking stopped on the M20 just after it got back to the UK. Quite possibly a jammer used to not reveal the location of the insurance recovery yard?

 

like alarms, given up on all of them (at least since they stop fitting them for free on new dukes few years back). for last few years managed to get insured without them being a necessity (even on the RS). one benefit of living in the sticks i suppose

 

5 years for insurance purposes not 3 unfortunately, I’ve had no points for the last 33 years, I’ve managed to rack up 9 points in the last 18 months.

 

All policies and history is on the MIDB - Motor Insurers Database. Less than full disclosure is a foolhardy exercise.

 

Website says GPS and RF for both products:

https://biketrac.co.uk/frequently-asked-questions#details-device-comparison

 

+1 for Hastings Direct. Seem very easy and straightforward to deal with and get good reviews. I Have both my v4 and monster insured with them after bike sure gave me a silly quote (and charged me a king's ransom to put the second bike on the policy for 1 month!).

 

Unfortunately these easily available jammers block all GPS signals as well as wi-fi, GSM etc. Mine are over 10 years old now so the newer ones will be even more effective I expect. If the tracker unit does not know where it is, it does not know it has been moved and certainly cannot be tracked. When I played around with mine in my old company car, my tracking maps were totally nonsensical. It could only draw straight lines from the location where it had a signal (then I switched on the jammer) and the area where I turned the jammer off again, maybe a hundred miles or more away Its proper tracking showed the route and all stops and roads travelled. If I jammed it all day, it recorded nothing at all. As an anti-theft device trackers are not great unless an amatuer has taken it. Physical security is always the best way, the more Thatcham security devices used the better. Downside is, they are a pain in the arse to put on and take off all the time, even more so to carry about It is a multi-million pound business dealing in high end stolen machines and cars. If they want yours specifically, it will go whatever you do, but making it harder to take time-wise and especially with cameras and lights and the like pointed on the vehicle are decent deterrents. Pro thieves do not want to spend more than a few seconds taking anything.

 

You could try Bennetts?
or go third party only and make your bike thief proof.

 

When I renewed my car insurance this year, which was not the related insurance to my car that was stolen, but another car, they confirmed that it had to be declared for 5 years, but only 3 years are taken into account to affect the premium on the relevant insurance.

This is what I was advised and I queried it and it was confirmed to be the case by them.

if you know differently and this has directly affected you then I would like to know the circumstances because I actually doubted that comment.

if this has directly affected you I would like to know the position you are in or were in because that’s a big difference in further affected premiums, for me at least.

 

Intersting on biketrack. Had it on current bike and previous one and pay each year for it, it’s as good as a condition on my insurance.

having worked at insurance businesses in my youth, even then before mid was really active have heard of people losing everything due to non disclosure then can only say as much as it hurts, don’t lie as they will do anything to avoid paying around 30k a second time!

 

They will do anything to avoid paying, full stop

 

I don’t doubt it. In 2005 I had a 999S nicked which at the time was worth a chunk of money. Police weren’t interested. Got a reference number. Standard. But by fuck, the underwriters were interested. I was visited and interviewed over the course of the afternoon. Crime scene, keys, photos, numerous questions- you name it. It’s like I was the suspect and not the victim.

I got paid out no bother, but it was an eye opener. And if people have modded their pride and joy and not declared said turbo/super chargers to the suits, if it gets nicked, pray it stays nicked

 

No help to OP but sadly no system will stop the scrotes from nicking something they want except for human intervention. My system is to have enoughsecurity that it will take power tools to get through the locks and a baby monitor hidden in the garage. Anyone so much as farts in that garage at night and I will know about it and ensure they very much regret that decision. They are the cheapest best protection imho. Just hope the OP can get something sorted, ‘kin nightmare situation for any biker to be in.