[Rajeevraj]

Around a year back, Bajaj Allianz had launched a Drivesmart range of insurance policies which intended to use driving patterns and related data to help drive down insurance costs. (Related Thread) (Bajaj Allianz introduces Drive Smart: Insurance based on your driving pattern). My policy has been with Bajaj for the last few years and when it was time to renew the policy for my Vento, noticed this option pop up on the website. Thought will give it a shot and opted for the Drivesmart Premium Policy.

Summary about the benefits called out by Bajaj as well as the Plan details below:

The connected car concept is not new. In fact Honda recently launched an App and Device that does some of these things. (Related Thread (Honda India launches mobile app & communication device - Honda Connect)). The tie in to insurance, on a commercial scale, I believe is being done for the first time here.

[Rajeevraj]

About the device

Once you have signed up for this policy Bajaj sends you the device along with the policy schedule. There is no separate charge for this device, but obviously the Drivesmart policies cost more than the regular ones but also include some additional features. So difficult to exactly pinpoint the cost that Bajaj is passing on to the consumer. There are no additional monthly charges. The device plugs in to the OBD Port. Each device has a unique id which one enters into the Mobile App.

The device and the platform are said to be powered by CarIQ which seems to be a start up in the connected vehicle space.

Platform Architecture (Courtesy: https://mycariq.com/platform.php)

This is how the device looks when connected. A slightly smaller size would have ensured the device is hidden and not easily visible to a casual observer.

An explanation of the lights on the device

[Rajeevraj]

Getting it running and features

When you install the App, there is a Drivesmart tile. Clicking on it will enable you to enter the Device ID. Once this is done, the tab will show an 'Active State'. Pretty straightforward and no complex set up steps.

Once you click on the DriveSmart tile, you get the below set of options

MyCar

The My Car tile throws up the below set of options. The Summary tab is explained a bit more below. Nothing unique about the rest of the options. Location Sharing enables you to share the real time location. Nothing different from what Google Maps or associated tools enable. Document valet again is nothing but a location to upload docs. About car gives basic info about the car. The Fuel Tab gives a real time view of nearby fuel stations.

The summary gives the below info. Not sure about the accuracy of the Engine errors or battery status as yet. Assume it is very basic info. Good bit of info is the last seen location which can be shared or navigated to. Can be useful in several instances.

Some additional basic stats on time spent, average speeds

The Alerts tab gives a list of alerts triggered. More on what the alerts mean in the subsequent section

Analytics

The Analytics Tab is probably the most interesting one. Gives the below options.

Click on Weekly Summary and you get as shown below. Summarized into 4 areas. This is data for the last one week of driving. Not very high usage and all in the city. With that in mind the data summary looked accurate. The only 'Good' Parameter was the 'Wrong Gear' % and of course, being an automatic and on top of that a DSG, not surprised to see that. The DSG would rarely be in a wrong gear.

Efficiency and Economy Trends

This tab gives basic charts related to fuel efficiency and money spent on fuel. Interestingly there is no place to enter the price per liter. I still see the total amount spent on fuel. I believe there is reference data available on the cloud platform to do the calculations. The efficiency reported seems in line with what the MID indicates. Chart does not look good as there was not enough data.

The final 'Reports' tab allows you to select a time range and generate a report out of this. The report is categorized into the below sections

• Driving Gear: Apparently the interface does not recognize a 7 speed AT. Keeping that aside, the distribution seems fair and in line with Bangalore traffic
  
  
• Driving Speeds: Again, as expected considering the commute areas and times in the week mentioned.
  
  
• Driver Score: Uses all the parameters in the report to come up with a score. Too early to comment on how this changes.
  
  
• Driving Summary: Summary of all the trips made in that time period.
  
  
• Infractions and Rash Driving Summary: The application has certain flags. The ones I have seen include- RashAccelaration, Sudden Lane Change, Sudden Braking. More details below.

The infractions and violations are interesting. The app captures the exact location where the alert was triggered. I reviewed a few of them.

• Sudden Lane Change Alert: Looking back on the time and location, I would say the flag was correct. Was on a 2 lane road stuck behind a car moving very slowly with good amount of traffic from the opposite direction. When a small window of opportunity came up, I popped into S mode and did a quick overtake which of course involved a sudden lane change.
  
  
• Sudden Braking: Reviewed 2 instances flagged. Both can be considered accurate. One was my fault- Noticed a little late a cab in front braking for a hump and had to brake harder than normal. The 2nd one was a case where a bike suddenly popped into the main road from a side road. No choice but to slam on the brakes.
  
  
• Rash Acceleration: I expect to see a lot of this, with the TSI-DSG combo, the tendency is to take off fast from rest and I expect the app to flag the natural acceleration of the TSI as Rash.

Trips

The Trips Menu is a pretty standard one. shows the details of your daily trips along with the route and map details. You can also create custom trip reports by selecting the relevant dates and generating one.

Location Sharing

Real time location sharing enables one to share the location for a specified period of time ranging from 30 min to 12 hours. Not very different from sharing in Google or WhatsApp, of course, key difference is that it is the location of the car rather than via the mobile of a person inside the car. Useful again if the car is chauffeur driven, been given for valet parking or being picked up for service.

[Rajeevraj]

Settings Menu

The Settings menu enables one to configure certain items. These include enabling/disabling location sharing, configuring various alerts. For example one can set speed limits and enable alerts based on a predetermined frequency. Once can also set the geo fence based on the map and trigger an alert if the car leaves the Geo Fence.

[Rajeevraj]

Summary and other points

• Overall I liked what it offered. Not all of it are unique features in any way, but as it is put together into one package, felt useful. The app felt well written and did not face any errors or navigation issues in the usage so far.
  
  
• This can only be opted at the time of renewal or when buying a new policy from Bajaj. The device can be used for 3 years but will be disabled if you do not renew the policy with Bajaj or change to a regular policy.
  
  
• As per Bajaj, the device should work for sure in all cars manufactured after 2010.
  
  
• As per the CarIq website, you can also buy this device independently with a yearly subscription. I think around 5k. Not sure if all the features will come through as is or if the Bajaj Version is customised.
  
  
• I initially thought that the device transmits to the phone and then to the cloud. But that is not the case. It directly transmits to the cloud and data is analyzed and pushed down into the app.
  
  
• Could not find any tear down of the device. From various sources what I inferred is that the unit has a GPRS modem as well a GPS unit with some storage. In cases of no network, it stores data until it can
  transmit. Maybe technical experts in this domain can thrown more light.
  
  
• With the limited use so far, the distances, locations and trip captures have been very accurate. Only one instance where I noticed one half of a trip did not show up.
  
  
• The FAQ indicates that there is an alert generated if the device is disconnected, I tried removing it for a few seconds and did not see anything. I guess there is some threshold. Need to check further.
  
  
• Many of the analytics features may be quite useful if the car is driven by a driver most of the time.
  
  
• Bajaj says in their FAQ, as well as in a clarification to the earlier thread here (Link (Bajaj Allianz introduces Drive Smart: Insurance based on your driving pattern)) that they are not going to use this info to penalize bad driving habits (Primarily because setting at baseline for bad driving based on rules is next to impossible) but they will use the information to reward good behavior. For example if a person is able to drive in a city like Bangalore with minimal hard braking, sudden lane changes, fast acceleration, then it definitely indicates a good driving pattern.
  
  
• The FAQ also says one can expect a reduction in premium 'upto 30%' based on data from this. Again, very subjective and need to see how it pans out.
  
  
• Another review (My tryst with Usage Based Insurance - Progressive's telematics device, Snapshot) of a similar device on the forum (from outside India).
  

[Aditya]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the Insurance Section. Thanks for sharing!

[sleepyhead148]

A timely review @rajeevraj. Rating the thread 5 stars. Just one question (and pardon me if it's a noob one). Is the driver score going to have any serious impact on the premium to be paid from the subsequent year(s)?

[libranof1987]

Great review; thanks for sharing.

Couple of points:

1) Has Bajaj Allianz mentioned how often they will review the data? When they say that premiums could go down based on "good" driving, have they mentioned -
a) what constitutes good behavior. No/maximum permissible flags under RashAccelaration, Sudden Lane Change, Sudden Braking
b) baseline on how many flags allowed per month/quarter/year

2) While they say they won't penalize drivers on bad driving now; I'd imagine they would once they have a large enough sample size

3) Very, very interesting to see the list of partners: Uber in particular. Imagine how immensely valuable your driving data is to them! They can manage their drivers better, especially on the UberPool platform

4) Having this device in your car perhaps allows you certain features: geo-fencing for example. Is that correct? So, for a small bump in your premium to get this device, you get a very useful anti-theft feature

I don't exactly want to be an early adopter on this, but wouldn't mind such a device, but only after the consequences are clear.

Oh, and the privacy bit. In today's world, privacy is so cheap and easy, it isn't probably even worth a fight!

[ROG_AK]

Thank you for the great review. Can the data be used to deny / approve insurance claims?

[paragsachania]

Thanks for a very informative thread again Rajeev on a subject that is slowly redefining the Automotive industry as a whole - Whether its Insurance or beyond.

This thread interested me more because 2 Years before, I had a the privilege of being one of the few testers of such a device for a Singapore based Start-up by couple of Indians and a BHPian was a very close friend of his and recommended my name due to the very frequent driving on the highways that I used to take up then.

The device was similar to what you have posted, connecting to the OBD Port, with a SIM Card reader and a GPS chip for location tracking.

Since I was into testing and reporting this and recommend things that could improve the features both in terms of user friendliness to the driver/owner as well as definite & tangible data to someone who is tracking various elements - It could be the insurance provider or the owner of a car who's hired a driver and wants to track his driving styles.

- Speed alerts with 3 beeps, based on the allowable speed that the user could set using the App on his phone

- Alerts to take a break based on the no of hours since last crank

- Fuel Efficiency, OBD readings and more of the usual paramters for the journey; Average speeds, overall journey details from Point A to B

In fact, all we testers were part of Whatsapp group where we could report shortcomings of the app. One such example was the Low Fuel warning & Distance to Empty where the app still needed good configuration in terms of defining the Fuel tank size, the Engine Displacement and Power, Car's weight 'et al based on which, after a lot of tankful methods and the parameters captured by the fuel injected quantity, the App would still not get closer to the real world figures. But then, that is what we were there for - Test these devices!

Apart from this, what really interested me was the driving style parameters, especially sudden Braking, sudden acceleration and sudden lane change.

The G-Sensor's sensitivity was something I could not adjust but I was thinking about various aspects here - That a typically low slung sedan may pass on less values than a Scoprio or a Safari whenever they change lanes at the same speed.

Also, when it comes to sudden acceleration, the definition of "sudden" would again need to be heavily customized depending on the car you drive - There are many cars we drive today that deliver a turbo kick, which is quite a good push into your back feeling even if the driver is not aggressive at all.

Like libranof1987 says, to come up with anything like this that is not just successful but does justice for all kinds of crowd - The Driver, the type of vehicle and the intellect levels of the actual the person who validates and rates you should undergo a lot of cycles of testing and customization with 100s of parameters.

Heck, I feel this should be smart enough to pick up details based on what road you are driving (City road or expressway) and then capture speeds done within city roads or highways and profile you whether you are a safe driver who abides by rules or not.

A long way to go but certainly a very interesting way to leverage telematics!

Thanks again for a wonderfully narrated thread.

[bhaskaracs]

A very comprehensive review indeed. Thanks for sharing.

A few questions:

Are they charging a hefty premium on the service (and potentially binding a few customers through this device over a 2-3 three year horizon) right at the front? Rewards for better driving due in future are not going to compensate initial excess they charge. I was evaluting this for my 2014m Elantra. In Nov 2016 I bought a zero depreciation Bajaj car insurance policy for nearly 30K. Cut to 2017, i wanted to indulge myself a bit and receievd a DriveSmart quote (all other policy features staying constant) of 39,500 I understand TPP increased by Rs.1200 or so in 2017 and then the GST. But this is still very high considering the 10% lower IDV. I feel this is primarily targetted at policies up for renewal switch to Bajaj, because existing customers can do an apple to apple.

Also the 30% max discount is arguably offered only on the Own Damage! So net-net one may not save much. On an average it could be around 15% discount on OD.

[TorqueyTechie]

Thanks Rajeev for the review. I was not aware of this kind of device in India. Until my stint in US, I used to have a similar device from one of the insurance providers. Based on the feedback from the device, I used to get discounts or my premium used to get bumped up during renewals.

As you have rightly mentioned, its very difficult to judge a person as a bad driver as the driving/riding dynamics is completely different here with more complex scenarios thrown in the mix. I think it is more beneficial to the driver rather than the company with this info though not sure how many would opt for it or even know about it.

[Santoshbhat]

Thanks Rajeev for the very detailed report. To be honest, I don't see why any customer would want to put this leash around their neck? and that too by paying money out of their own pocket .

Basically the devise allows them to collect all kinds of data about how we drive, where we drive etc.. and they could very easily use it against us to deny a claim. Lets say the car meets with an accident and is a total damage case. What if they say the car was driven very rashly for an hour upto that point or if they say you were driving at 120 kph in a 80 kph zone? or that you did not service the car when it was due and compromised on safety (say brake pads were due for replacement) and deny your claim?

I also have privacy concerns. The way multiple insurance companies and call centres get hold of our phone numbers and hound us just before renewal due date, I won't be surprised if they start selling this data to interested third parties.

[vsun]

Thanks Rajeev for a very well explained review with pics.

Originally Posted by Santoshbhat

I don't see why any customer would want to put this leash around their neck? and that too by paying money out of their own pocket .

Basically the devise allows them to collect all kinds of data about how we drive, where we drive etc.. and they could very easily use it against us to deny a claim. Lets say the car meets with an accident and is a total damage case. What if they say the car was driven very rashly for an hour upto that point or if they say you were driving at 120 kph in a 80 kph zone? or that you did not service the car when it was due and compromised on safety (say brake pads were due for replacement) and deny your claim?

I also have privacy concerns. The way multiple insurance companies and call centres get hold of our phone numbers and hound us just before renewal due date, I won't be surprised if they start selling this data to interested third parties.

That's exactly how i feel, after reading the entire report. I won't go for this type of policy even if the company sells it with a heavy discount.

[Altocumulus]

Originally Posted by Santoshbhat

Thanks Rajeev for the very detailed report. To be honest, I don't see why any customer would want to put this leash around their neck? and that too by paying money out of their own pocket .

Basically the devise allows them to collect all kinds of data about how we drive, where we drive etc.. and they could very easily use it against us to deny a claim. Lets say the car meets with an accident and is a total damage case. What if they say the car was driven very rashly for an hour upto that point or if they say you were driving at 120 kph in a 80 kph zone? or that you did not service the car when it was due and compromised on safety (say brake pads were due for replacement) and deny your claim?

I also have privacy concerns. The way multiple insurance companies and call centres get hold of our phone numbers and hound us just before renewal due date, I won't be surprised if they start selling this data to interested third parties.

Originally Posted by vsun

Thanks Rajeev for a very well explained review with pics.

That's exactly how i feel, after reading the entire report. I won't go for this type of policy even if the company sells it with a heavy discount.

Completely echo the thoughts. There is hardly any highway in the country which has a limit of more than 80km/hr and 99.99999 recurring percentage of us go beyond this limit sometime or the other even in a Nano. This will be easily termed as overspeeding by the insurance companies and deny the claim. An example is there in a app as well, where sudden acceleration is termed as rash.

To add to this, I know of someone who has opted for a similar device through his insurance. He was excited initially and then with the above discussion stopped using the device. Guess what, he gets a call from the insurance company to fix it back or they will deny any claim for accidents when the device is not connected.