12 VCT Crime Reports – Copies Of

Making enquiries of the police (anyone) in respect of a stolen vehicle should be far simpler than with many other crimes because vehicles have unique identifiers (VRMs) and their stolen (or otherwise) status is easy to check. The police can also confirm the insurers identity because they have access to MID. Therefore you might think that satisfying the legitimate interest threshold for insurers who request a vehicle crime report should be straightforward.

However, there are 3 stumbling blocks which hinder or prevent access to this data:

The Memorandum of Understanding

I was at the original meeting with Cambridgeshire constabulary at the ABI’s offices in or about 2002.  The intentions were good but the process appeared more aligned to residential burglaries.  That having been said, the procedure worked and for years we paid the police for reports and received accounts of varying quality and use.  

The MoU appears, following conversations with some constabularies, to currently be unfit for purpose and the reasons appear to be::

• GDPR / DPA 2018 has everyone chasing their tails, being unsure of their own processes. If consent is freely given, if the ‘narrow gateways’ enabling release are satisfied, whether there are ‘positive policing outcomes’, are all recent terms or phases I have been met with for refusing disclosure.

• The MoU was initially aimed at ABI members, a development saw a similar process for Lloyds members but the remaining UK authorised insurers whose ‘names are not on the door’ are prejudiced, they are left out, excluded access

• An unwillingness of some constabularies or their data protection staff to engage (understand?) the enabling sections of the DPA 2018.

What does a victim / insured get from this?  While insurers and the police have a procedural standoff about the way in which information might be disclosed, it overlooks that:

• There is a victim;
• The victim possibly only involved the police to obtain a crime number – by the time we are seeking details, the likelihood of recovery is remote;
• It is the police who are seen as preventing settlement – by their own victim, local resident;
• If the car is not found, the best the victim can hope for is to receive a payment and put themselves back into the position they were pre-loss … with a car!  The police do not achieve this but currently, on occasions, prevent or delay this.

It is the victim who suffers because relevant facts of the claim cannot be corroborated promptly. 

In September 2018 I was emailed by the City of London’s ‘Director of Information (CISO & DPO)’:

“The guidance currently being drafted would not see policing release information to a broker, loss adjuster or other third party.  In all cases future police disclosures of this nature would be made directly to the relevant ABI member and they would be guided to disseminate, with controls, to those third parties acting on their behalf.”

Far from helpful, a retrograde step and to my knowledge, 6 months later,  yet to be completed.

However, DPA 2018 appears to provide a means to circumvent this administrative inefficiency by way of a Subject Access Request by the insured for a copy of the crime report:

• A SAR reply must be provided in a calendar month from request – currently we can wait a lot longer for a crime report;
• The insured / victim will be asked to provide identity, which should be a formality because the Police already have their details; 
• The information should be requested electronically, enabling ease of transmission to others;
• The facility is provided free of charge.