Dashboard cameras are becoming the next ‘must-have’ automotive tech. My name’s Ben, and I work on the travel team here at PayingTooMuch.com. Having watched ITV’s ‘Car Crash Britain: Caught on Camera’ I went and bought a dashboard camera (dashcam) and have been filming away for a few weeks. Here’s a few things I’ve learnt along the way.
What’s a dashcam?
Quite simply, it’s a camera attached to the windscreen which films the road ahead. Now, you might be tempted to just use a Go-Pro action camera, or similar miniature camera. But doing that you’ll constantly have to keep wiping the memory card. A dashboard camera will simply record over the oldest footage, meaning you won’t have to do any daily maintenance at all.
If you want to save any footage, just press a button on the camera and the footage will be protected. Alternatively, if you have a camera with a G-force meter, the camera will automatically protect videos when high G-forces are detected.
Why?
You are probably wondering why? Why do I want to record my driving? Well, here are a few reasons:
- Prove my innocence in the event of being involved in a crash or incident
- Protect myself against becoming a victim of a deliberate crash of another road user for the purpose of insurance fraud
- Assist in the resolution of another road incident not involving myself
- Reduction of car insurance premiums
What features do I need?
After research on the internet I came across a website from The Telegraph comparing lots of different cameras. There are so many features, but the most important ones to me were:
- GPS – ability to show where the footage was taken and provide an accurate speed
- G-meter – camera automatically ‘protects’ film when a high G-force is detected
- Motion detection – detects and records when car has been crashed into or vandalised when parked
- Wide-angled lens – I want to record as much of my view as possible
- Long wire – A long wire is essential if you want to hide the cable out of sight
- Big screen – I wanted to make sure I was recording the correct view and could watch the video back if I wanted to.
With all this considered, I decided to go for the Netbase 402G Professional from Halfords for £134.10. Mine came with a free ‘welcome pack’ which included a memory card. No memory card comes with the camera as standard, so you’ll need to source one.
Install and operation
The installation was very straight forward. I attached the camera to the windscreen using the suction cup, as per the instructions. Full details on placement can be found here, but the basics are:
- Out of the driver’s direct line of sight
- Inside the window-wiper arc
The best place is behind the rear-view mirror on the passenger’s side. I ran the cable around the windscreen, down the inside of the door, under the steering wheel and into the cigarette lighter socket.
Operation is simple; the camera automatically turns on with the car’s ignition and starts recording straight away. The instruction manual recommends ‘reformatting’ the memory card every month to remove any protected files that may have accumulated which can take up valuable memory.
Reduction in insurance
Swiftcover offer a 10% discount for fitting a dashcam, rising to a 12.5% discount if the camera is made by Nextbase. The reason for the discount is that Swiftcover believe that by fitting a dashcam, people drive more carefully, and the footage helps them apportion blame quickly in the event of an incident, thus saving them time and money.
You can get this discount through PayingTooMuch.com. Simply get a quote for car insurance, click on the Swiftcover price (discount won’t be applied on the initial quote page) and you’ll be directed to the Swiftcover website where you can select a ‘Dashcam’ option to get the discount.
Police caution
Just a quick note of caution; in the event of an incident the police can seize the camera and video footage as evidence. If the footage shows any driver (including me!) acting illegally then they are more than likely to prosecute. Remember, the footage also has the GPS derived speed, so there’s no hiding from the law if you’re caught acting illegally.
