Hi,

We have just bought an ex police dog vehicle which has had all the back seats removed and has been fitted out with 2 permenant dog kennels, it will be used for business use (security dogs) but also for my agility dogs to go to shows in so i dont have to take my van everywhere. Does anyone have any experience in insuring a vehicle like this?

I do have a dog van but it is just a van, not modified in any way, has just got a 2 up 2 down kennel fit that can be removed easily so it is insured as a van but with a note added that its got dog cages.

Any help would be great

Have PMed you
Diane

Hi , I have a ford focus estate , exactly the same as yours , I was honest and told my then insurance company about it and they wanted 3 times the normal amount as the normal estate version !!! I said but I can only have 1 passenger , I could have got fully comp insurance for the same estate not being modified for £160 ! some would not even insure it . But I found a company called Performance Direct it wasn't a problem with them and I have had the car insured with them for 8 years now and it gets cheaper every year !  Miranda

I don't have a 'dog modified' vehicle, but between me & OH we have owned more than our fair share of odd, imported, one-off & hard to insure vehicles (including one of the UK's largest road going monster trucks!) and have always found Adrian Flux are able to provide cover.

They're not the cheapest but seem to bypass the whole 'computer says no' standardised systems & work on a very individual basis. We have also used Performance Direct as mentioned above.

I have gone with direct line now, I tried a couple and they wanted quite a lot to insure it (nearly the cost of the car!)  The main problem we had is that as well as it being for business use we are keeping our other car and dog van so also have no 'no claims bonus' to use on it. Direct line just made a note on the policy that the seats had been removed and kennels fitted in it instead as it wasn't something they had listed as a modification. Also they insure class 1 business use as standard and not as an additional premium so it wasn't that bad in the end.