Vehicle insurance

Insurance cover when you're organising transport

You need to have insurance cover for any vehicle used for a guiding activity.

When you’re organising transport for a guiding activity that involves girls or volunteers, you must have insurance cover in place for the vehicle that you’re using.

Using your own vehicle

You can use your own vehicle for Girlguiding volunteering if you have the right insurance cover. Volunteering is defined as travelling to and from meetings, trainings, activities or residential events as a volunteer, including transporting other members, including children.

If you buy your own vehicle to use for guiding, you’ll need to take out insurance on it. You can choose cover from any reputable insurance company, or arrange insurance from Girlguiding’s partner, Unity Insurance Services.

Using your own vehicle insurance

Some vehicle insurance policies exclude transportation of non-family members and only cover you and your family. Check your policy to make sure you know what it covers.

Girlguiding won’t cover the costs if you lose your no-claims bonus or you have to pay an excess because of an accident that happened while you were on a guiding activity.

If you're looking for more information, The Association of British Insurers have useful guidance on volunteer driving and insurance. This document includes information on each vehicle insurance company and their policy on using cars for voluntary purposes.

Hiring and borrowing vehicles

When you hire a vehicle from a commercial hire company, there’ll be statutory requirements for insurance cover. This cover may be available in different ways.

Insurance purchased at the same time that your hire the vehicle, with the premium forming part of the total charge. The hire company's policy usually offers comprehensive cover for the vehicle, plus third party and passenger liability.

Check the cover that you decide to take and ensure it’s good enough and correct for how you plan to use it.

When you hire or borrow a vehicle from an organisation that doesn’t specifically hire vehicles, it’s important to check if any insurance cover is available. If none is provided, then purchase separate cover.

When you hire or borrow a vehicle from an individual, you will usually need to purchase a specific policy so that the other person's policy is not exposed. You can also arrange to be added to the other person’s insurance policy. If their cover is for any driver, you should check that the use allows the hire or loan of the vehicle to you.

If you hire or borrow a minibus that doesn’t come with insurance as an option, please contact the insurance team for support in arranging cover. Please give them at least 2 weeks’ notice.

Contact our insurance team

For more information, please contact our insurance team, either by phoning 0845 260 1053 or by emailing [email protected].