Why it doesn’t pay to be a self-styled ‘celebrity’

With more and more average Joes turning ‘celebrity’ over night from reality TV shows like Big Brother and X Factor, online car insurance specialist, elephant.co.uk will now be accepting ‘celebrity’ as an occupation for their car insurance customers.

elephant.co.uk managing director, Brian Martin, said, “With so many celebrity wannabes gracing our TV screens in reality shows and more so-called celebrities appearing everyday, we couldn’t ignore that we may have customers who would be wrongly catergorised if listed as anything else.

“And, it’s not just reality TV stars but even the girlfriends and wives of footballers are now deemed celebrities in their own right.”

But being a celebrity can have its downsides, and elephant.co.uk thought it would be fun to see how much money some of the UK’s self styled celebrities would have saved on their car insurance had they stuck to their day job.

elephant.co.uk compared the rates for three ‘celebrities’ and their everyday alter egos. We looked at the cost for Jade Goody the dental nurse, compared to Jade Goody the celebrity, Brian Belo the data entry clerk compared to Brian Belo the Big Brother winner and Alex Curran the beautician compared to Alex Curran the ‘WAG’.

26-year-old Jade Goody lives in Bermondsey, South-East London. She lives with her partner and two children and drives a 2005 Range Rover Vogue.

Jade the ‘celebrity’ would pay 22% more for her insurance than Jade the dental nurse.

20-year-old Brian Belo lives in Basildon, Essex and drives a 2006 Ford Fiesta ST 3 door hatchback.
Brian the ‘celebrity’ would pay 40% more for his insurance than Brian the data entry clerk.

25-year-old Alex Curran lives in Liverpool. She drives a new Mercedes SLK280 SE. Alex the beautician would pay 14% more for her insurance than Alex the ‘WAG’.

Brian Martin continued, “It’s seems more and more people dream of being famous and aspire to the celebrity lifestyle. We just wanted to point out that being famous does also have its downsides and often there’s a price to pay for such fame. Celebrities have to pay more for things like insurance just because they are famous.”

In reality, the premiums these celebrities could end up paying would probably be higher still. One of the reasons famous people are charged higher premiums is due to the risk of them having other celebrities in the car and the huge costs that were be incurred should there be an accident. Alex Curran could expect her premiums to rise considerably due to the likelihood of her husband Steven Gerrard being a passenger. So if you do become a celebrity it makes more financial sense to stay with your unknown partner!