According to a new study by the Highway Loss Data Institute (HLDI) – part of the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) – the safety benefits from features such as automatic emergency braking, lane departure prevention, and high-beam assist “stack up” as multiple systems are bundled together and updated versions deliver better results to motorists.
[Above photo by AASHTO]
“As [these technologies] improve and become more common, we are seeing compounding crash reductions,” said Matt Moore, chief insurance operations officer at HLDI and IIHS, in a statement.
The most basic bundle consisted of a single feature, HLDI found – front automatic emergency braking (AEB), which in all these vehicles included forward collision warning. The most comprehensive bundle included front AEB with pedestrian detection, adaptive cruise control, high-beam assist, lane departure warning, lane departure prevention, rear AEB, and Driver Attention Alert – a feature designed to detect when the driver is fatigued or distracted.
Not only were the larger bundles more comprehensive, but they also included more advanced versions of the technologies in the smaller bundles, HLDI found. As a result of that bundling, reductions in claim frequency proved “substantial,” HLDI said – especially under property damage liability (PDL) and bodily injury liability (BIL) coverages. PDL coverage pays for crash damage that the at-fault driver’s vehicle causes to other people’s vehicles or property. BIL coverage pays to treat injuries caused to people in other vehicles or other road users.
HLDI’s study found that the most basic bundle was associated with a 13 percent reduction in PDL claim rates and a 9 percent reduction in BIL claim rates. In general, those benefits grew with the addition of each new technology, with the most comprehensive bundle linked to a 39 percent drop in PDL claim rates and a 21 percent fall in BIL claim rates, though the latter figure was not statistically significant, the firm stressed.
The bundle that added Driver Attention Alert was a notable exception, delivering no greater benefits with the addition of the new feature. It’s possible that the alert came into play too rarely to affect claim rates, HLDI noted, as it only activates after about 20 minutes of driving between 41 mph and 86 mph and may not function on roads without clear lane markings.
The most noticeable added reductions came with the addition of front AEB with pedestrian detection and rear AEB. Along with reducing pedestrian crashes, the updated front AEB systems were most likely better than their predecessors at preventing crashes with other vehicles. HLDI said, with rear AEB delivering bigger benefits because it prevents many of the low-speed parking lot incidents that make up the bulk of insurance claims.
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