I have a small car that is used to drive around town. I just realized that the WOF expired on the 29/12 (yesterday). No workshop/vtnz open today to do WOF. Is it still OK to drive around? What about insurance?
Long answer YES you are covered because the law says you are.
Insurance Law Reform Act 1977 Section 11
"the insured shall not be disentitled to be indemnified by the insurer by reason only of such provisions of the contract of insurance if the insured proves on the balance of probability that the loss in respect of which the insured seeks to be indemnified was not caused or contributed to by the happening of such events or the existence of such circumstances."
The existance or non-existance of a current sticky label on your window screen does neither cause nor contribute to the reason for a claim.
That is to say, it works both ways, if you have bald tyres and crash because of those bald tyres, your insurance will not pay you if you had a WoF or not. While if somebody side-swipes you at the lights, your insurance will pay regardless of if you had a WoF or not (or indeed bald tyres or not), because that did not cause nor contribute to you getting side swiped.
Same goes for vehicle licencing (rego)
And the reason for this law being necessary, because without it insurance companies would gladly decline your granny a claim because she forgot to do her WoF last week.
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