Fairy Tales
The other day while watching evening-time Television I observed an advert by Insurance Confidential (the industry’s representative body) which made me laugh.
The cause of my mirth was down to Insurance Confidential’s portrayal of Insurance Fraud & its explanation for the increases in Insurance premiums.
If you have not seen it, it is on the website http://insuranceconfidential.ie/, and well worth a watch.
For those who wish to see it for themselves, stop reading now. For those who are not bothered about watching it, I’ll continue.
The advert is similar to the cartoon SouthPark and displays two characters in a car. A bearded character in a hat called Sam is driving, and a character called Mark (who looks a bit like Tintin) is seated beside him. We are told by the storyteller that it is Mark’s car Sam is driving, and that Sam is uninsured.
We see the car hit a load of bollards and fly into the air turning over. The storyteller tells us, while the car is in the air that Sam thinks up a plan to gain compensation. He tells Mark (Tintin look-a-like) to say he was driving the car; Mark then puts in for a claim and Sam stays Shtum.
The advert subsequently shows a pile of €5 notes with a heading beside it saying ‘Cost of Insurance’. These €5 notes are pushed upwards by a smaller pile of €10 notes from below that increases the pile size. Beside this smaller pile a heading says ‘Cost of Fraud’. The storyteller informs the viewer their Insurance premiums are on average €50 higher because of Insurance Fraud like Sam’s.
Now why I got a giggle out of this advert was the car from the front, looked a bit like Del Boy’s three-wheel van from Only Fools & Horses (being yellow & having a similar shaped windscreen-frame); which reminded me of a scene from an episode where Rodney asks Del can they trade the van in for something else; Del Boy asks Rodney for a suggestion; and Rodney replies a Bus-pass.
If Insurance Confidential want to portray Insurance Fraud in a more serious light, (which they obviously do, with the storyteller finishing with, “it is not funny when it is your money, so if you see Insurance Fraud, report it”) I have a story they could use which might do the trick.
My story (done in a similar fashion to a SouthPark style cartoon) would begin with an elderly grey-haired character called Sean, seen driving up to his office premises in a car with a Mercedes sign on the front.
We would see Sean get out of the car and go into his office. He would then sit down on big black-backed chair and open letters containing insurance premiums. When he finished opening them he would divide this huge pile (of insurance premiums) into three smaller piles. He would then get up from the chair and go to the back door of his office. There, there would be three cars parked outside. Sean would be seen giving the drivers a pile each. They would then be seen to drive off in three different directions with an extended lined-arrow in front pointing out their different end destinations. One would go Sean’s Glass Business, another would go to Sean’s Cement Business & the other would end up at Sean’s Hotel Business.
We would then see an image of a pile of €5 notes with a heading beside them saying ‘Cost of Insurance’. These €5 notes would then be pushed up by a smaller pile of €10 notes from below to higher the size of the pile. Beside the smaller pile would be a heading saying, ‘Cost of Sean’.
The advert would finish with the storyteller informing the viewer that their insurance premiums now have a 2% levy added because of Sean’s Insurance Fraud. I can’t imagine any viewer with insurance laughing at that.
Poraic Cahill has recently authored a book, which is available for purchase by clicking here
Hashtags: #InsuranceFraud 
