Auto parts crunch has motor insurers fretting over soaring repair bills

A burgeoning scarcity of automotive spares in the Sultanate of Oman has motor insurers fretting that the resulting delays in the repairs of autos and settlement of claims may well impact on their fiscal statements and expose them to lawful motion and penalties.

Their considerations were being not long ago relayed by the Chairman of the Finance & Insurance coverage Committee at Oman Chamber of Commerce and Sector (OCCI) to the Vice-President of the Insurance coverage Sector at the Money Market place Authority (CMA).

“We approached the CMA, as the regulator of the insurance coverage sector, to use its very good workplaces to acquire up this problematic challenge with, among many others, the Ministry of Commerce, Business and Investment decision Promotion,” reported Murtadha M J Ibrahim al Jamalani, Chairman of OCCI’s Finance & Insurance policy Committee.

“Their urgent intervention is required to obtain useful answers to the extensive-standing challenge relevant to the dearth of car components in the region. Whilst insurers are not to blame for this scarcity, they are under extreme pressure from their policyholders whose motor vehicles are held up in garages and workshops for want of the requisite spare pieces.”

The spare components crunch dates to the start of the pandemic two decades ago when global lockdowns disrupted the source of automotive elements, between scores of other varieties of items, sourced from about the planet. While materials have resumed in the wake of the easing of the pandemic in numerous parts of the globe, shipping bottlenecks and offer chain problems keep on to pose a dilemma, say specialists.

Speaking to the Observer, Al Jamalani observed that motor insurance policy companies come to feel prone to authorized action in the present-day instances. “If, for case in point, a taxi driver whose livelihood is derived only from the procedure of his taxi, which is trapped in some garage for want of elements, the courts or Shopper Defense Authority may possibly buy his insurance provider to compensate him for decline of earnings.”

Substantially, the lack has also hampered the well timed repairs of vehicles that were ruined in flash flooding joined to Cyclone Shaheen previous October. “This is producing the insurers increasingly concerned that they are uncovered to authorized challenges stemming from the prolonged delays in the repairs of the motor vehicles of their policyholders.”

When the dearth of automobile areas is principally attributable to the lingering results of the pandemic, Al Jamalani also holds the nearby automotive marketplace partly liable for the protracted mother nature of the crisis.

“In part, the scarcity has been compounded by what we consider is reluctance on the aspect of vehicle businesses to devote in adequate shares,” he mentioned. “Even typical things, these types of as windscreens, bumpers, and lights are not in inventory. The brokers say that some pieces have to be airfreighted in the situation, which leaves the insurer bearing the supplemental charge.”

Confronted with greater expenditures, coupled with the prospect of compensation payouts, insurance policies firms may perhaps have to contemplate elevating their rates, Al Jamalani stated. “Motor rates have remained stagnant for the past various yrs owing to intense sector competition, as effectively as pushback from customers in opposition to any endeavor to increase premiums. But if the crisis over auto spares is not settled, then the insurance coverage organizations will have no other alternative but to increase rates,” he pointed out.

In this regard, Al Jamalani urged the Ministry of Commerce, Sector and Financial commitment Promotion to move in and provide all stakeholders alongside one another to explore fast and realistic options to the spare areas crunch.