Man changed gender on ID to save money on car insurance
A 23-year-old driver has gone to drastic measures to reduce his car insurance premium on a new car, by legally changing his gender to save more than $1,100.
The Canadian insisted he still identified as a man, but legally altered the gender on his birth certificate and drivers licence to save money.
“I’m a man, 100 per cent. Legally, I’m a woman,” said the man who CBC News identified as David.
“I did it for cheaper car insurance.”
The young driver, who had previously made an insurance claim, told the news site he was given a quote of about $4,680 a year to insure a 2018 Chevrolet Cruz. He asked the insurer what the price would be if he were a woman taking out the same policy and was told it would be about $1,130 cheaper.
“I was pretty angry about that. And I didn’t feel like getting screwed over any more,” he told CBC.
The Alberta man reportedly went to the trouble of telling a doctor he planned to start identifying as a woman, and had the physician write a letter to that effect.
He sent the letter off to the government registration department and within a few weeks he received a new birth certificate indicating his gender as female. With the documentation he needed, David then changed his drivers licence, allowing him to take out the cheaper insurance policy as a woman.
The exercise saved him about $94 per month, however the move could land him at risk of fraud, which had potential issues for future insurance applications.
According to Allianz Car Insurance, gender is just one factor that insurers considered when calculating premiums, along with variables like the driver’s age, location, and driving record.
“Females have less accidents than males,” an Allianz spokesperson told Yahoo 7.
