Mary Wallace, who lived with her husband John in Wallasey had not seen her mother Edna for well over six months and since Edna's health was starting to deteriorate she decided that she should drive over and stay with her mother for a few days; not an easy task since Edna lived right at the very tip of Scotland, not far from Loch Ness! Nevertheless she and her husband Tim packed their trusty old Ford Capri with a few essentials and changes of clothing for three or four days and set off for Scotland on a bright and sunny day which deteriorated rapidly the closer she got to the border! By the time she reached her mother's cottage later that night the rain was coming down by the bucket full and they were both very relieved when they were able to get into the warmth of the cottage and out of the stormy weather. Edna had a warm meal waiting for them and after such a long drive they were both in their early and slept like logs until fairly late the following morning when a great shock awaited them.

The space in front of Edna's cottage where they had parked their car had turned into a mini lake about 3 inches deep as a result of a couple of blocked drains, so it was with some trepidation that John walked across in his bare feet (no, he had never dreamt of taking wellingtons!) And just as he was reaching the car door he slipped, twisted his leg and fell heavily! It took him some moments to hobble back into the cottage and when he checked his leg his ankle was already looking rather black in parts stock Fortunately the local doctor only lived a few hundred yards away, and after a quick phone call he was able to visit the cottage, and conclude that there was nothing basically wrong with John's leg at a few days rest would not put right. The problem was that he was unable to drive temporarily, and although Mary had a full driving licence she was not insured to drive the family car. This could have been a serious problem for them but for the fact that John knew of a temporary car insurance website which he had looked at for a friend some months earlier. A visit to the site revealed an extremely simple application form, and 10 min later Mary was insured fully comprehensively to drive the car for the next seven days, by which time they expected John to have made a full recovery.

The website that they visited gave them the option of taking out temporary car insurance for anything between one and 28 days, and they can even choose whether to have comprehensive cover, the legal basic minimum. On this occasion buying temporary cover in this way saved a very difficult situation to develop, and Mary was able to legally drive their car back from the wilds of Scotland without having to worry about the very serious penalties that she could have had to face had she been foolish enough to drive without insurance.