VW makes it two years in a row at BIVSA

The eight annual British Insurance Vehicle Security Awards (BIVSA) took place last week. For the second year running, as well as winning a number of categories, Volkswagen retained their 'Top Car Manufacturer' award. 

VW took the gold in the following classes: Large Multi Person Vehicle (the Sharan); Crossover (the Tiguan, for the second year running); Luxury Car (the Phaeton - a fourth win in eight years); Light Van (the Caddy); Pick Up / Light Commercial Vehicle (the new Amarok). 

The BIVSA are hosted and presented by Thatcham (the Motor Insurance Repair Research Centre), and endorsed by the AA and What Car? Magazine, as well as the Department for Transport and Home Office. They aim to raise consumer awareness and reward security-conscious innovation in new cars and vans. Judges apply criteria from the New Vehicle Security Ratings (NSVR) scheme to draw up a shortlist of vehicles that are then re-evaluated to pick the overall winners. Those that make it onto the shortlist must score a maximum of 5 stars for theft prevention and exceed current insurance requirements, among other things.

The overall award is given to the manufacturer which has the most cars that satisfy Thatcham's stringent security criteria. This year, both VW and Audi had ten cars in this league. To resolve the tie-break, sales over the past 12 months were totted up - the rationale being to identify the manufacturer who has provided these benefits to the most consumers. Volkswagen scooped first place by a little over 400 sales.

Thatcham's vehicle security manager Mike Briggs said that the overall award recognised Volkswagen's "tenacity in devising security solutions to design out crime and make its vehicles more secure" and added that they should be "justifiably proud" of their achievements.