Member Article

10 Ways to Reduce The Cost of Your Car Commute

Getting to work by car every day can be an expensive business. Commuters are always looking to find ways to cut costs and leave more in their bank accounts. The team at OSV have done some useful research and come up with an infographic revealing the top ten ways to reduce what you pay for that daily commute.

Here are a few of the highlights:

Get Into Sharing

More and more workers have seen the potential of car sharing. Technology has made it a lot easier with sites like Liftshare and BlaBlaCare. These make it simple to contact other commuters in your area and pool resources. As you might expect three people sharing one car is much cheaper than everyone travelling separately.

Efficient Driving

You can make small changes to your driving that means you use less fuel on your commute to work. Avoid breaking sharply, move off gradually from any lights and drop your overall speed. You’ll be surprised how much it saves over a year.

Stay Out of the Rush Hour

Delays and frustrations are only one part of the morning commute during rush hour. It can also cost you a lot more in petrol. Starting a little earlier or later, will mean that you get a smoother ride in and don’t use so much fuel.

Parking Costs and How to Avoid Them

Should you work in a large town or city, chances are it’s going to cost to park and this can add a significant amount to your daily commute. One tip is to find somewhere free to park that’s a walking distance away from your place of business. Not only do you save money but you get some good exercise into boot.

Use Tech to Check Petrol Prices

There’s quite a lot of technology around nowadays that is designed to make our lives easier. You can download a simple price checker app to find out where the cheapest prices at the petrol pump are. That way, when you do fill up, you can save a few pennies.

Shop for Insurance

Another thing that can add cost to your travel is that all-important insurance. For those who use their car a lot for work rather than just the daily commute, it can cost even more. Shopping around once your renewal date comes up should be standard practice if you want to keep those premiums down.

The Benefits of Car Clubs

These are increasingly popular especially in big cities like London where cars can be picked up whenever you need them and driven to your desired location. You don’t have the hassle of things like repairs and breakdown cover – you pay a joining fee and then just fork out for petrol and parking fees.

The research by the team at OSV suggests a number of smaller things you can do to save money such as switching off the air con in your car and making sure you check your tyre pressure regularly.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Chanelle McGarry .