Autoline Insurance has launched an optional dashcam feature to its ChilliDrive young driver insurance product.
The Newry-based insurance firm said this will monitor location, speed, dates and times of every journey and records footage in the event of an accident, which is automatically sent to insurers with no user intervention required.
The dashcam automatically starts recording in the event of an incident whilst driving, capturing the moment of impact in a collision, and is automatically uploaded to the driver's smartphone.
Government statistics from NI Direct show that nearly 6,000 injury collisions were recorded in Northern Ireland in 2018, resulting in a total of 8,720 casualties.
Compared to other areas in the UK and based on 2017 collision data, Northern Ireland has the highest number of road deaths by region with 34 deaths per million in population.
Autoline claims that ChilliDrive offers driver assistance features, such as lane departure alerts, forward collision warning systems and fatigue alerts, which will hopefully help combat Northern Ireland's high number of road accidents.
App upgrades include a new in-app chat to allow easy access to a support team and enhanced mentoring and feedback from the Institute of Advanced Motorists.
Julie Gibbons, Managing Director at Autoline Insurance said: “In addition to being able to track and score driving behaviour, feedback is available post-journey enabling young drivers to modify behaviour and take corrective action encouraging them to think twice about how they drive. There is also a dedicated support team that can be contacted via the app, an easy way to get advice when needed.”
The improved app has received backing from the UK’s largest independent road safety charity, IAM RoadSmart.
Spokesperson for the charity, Paul Woozley commented: “Telematics provides an effective measurement of driving risk and by helping drivers develop their skills we are hopefully mitigating the risk of an incident or claim and possibly reducing their future premiums.”
The new and improved ChilliDrive app is free to download but it is only available to new customers when purchasing their policy and existing customers at the point of renewal.
Autoline has partnered with MiTAC Digital Technology Corporation (MDT), the world’s largest dashcam manufacturer, and UK InsurTech company, Inzura, to introduce the new technology.
