A study conducted by Continental Tyres into the tyre safety habits of UK motorists has yielded some sobering results for UK van insurance policyholders.
Although the study did not deal specifically with the tyre safety habits of van insurance customers, instead looking at a wider cross-section of 4,000 members of the motoring public, it should help serve as a wake-up call to any regular road user.
Alarmingly, the study found that nearly 40% of drivers had never checked the condition of their vehicle's tyres, while more than 30% had never checked their tread-depth. Shockingly, even fewer knew what the legal tread-depth is.
Tim Bailey, a spokesperson with Continental, commented, "One in five drivers polled have suffered a blow-out and three-quarters of us understand that low tyre tread depth causes accidents in wet weather yet we still do not recognise the risks we take by not checking and replacing tyres more regularly. People just don't think about it enough or they don't know what to look for."
Although correctly-inflated and well-maintained tyres are essential to every motorist, van insurance policyholders need to be particularly vigilant in caring for theirs, simply because of the huge mileage they clock up while behind the wheels of their commercial vehicles.