Modern Vespa

I was wondering what it costs us to operate our Vespas.
I have just renewed Sunny's annual registration permit and recently adjusted my comprehensive vehicle insurance policy,
so I can quote these up-to-date numbers...

Annual vehicle registration ZAR288 (road tax)
Comprehensive vehicle insurance ZAR485.45x12=ZAR5 825.40
Total = ZAR6 113.40

= US$400
= E350
= AUD545
= GBP300

Last edited by Fudmucker on Fri Nov 12, 2021 10:03 am; edited 1 time in total

That's a bit pricier than what I pay. Our road tax, a fee you must pay to use your Vespa 300 on the road is £43. Insurance (comprehensive cover) is £85 for me but of course is variable per person and dependant on your driving record. Total £128 for the year. That's about $170 I think. Don't know what that is translated to your S/A currency.

You are doing well Ian, for me...

Comprehensive vehicle insurance (including breakdown recovery) ~ 154.00 GBP
Annual Road Tax ~ 43.00 GBP
Vehicle Roadworthy Test (MOT) ~ 29.00 GBP

Total ~ £226.00 GBP

Don't forget the cost of the MOT - GBP30 - you won't get the VED (Vehicle Excise Duty aka 'road tax', which it definitely isn't) without it.

About ZAR2 630
More than twice my cost.
Our MOT (Roadworthy Certificate) is only applicable when the vehicle changes ownership.

226.00 GBP = ZAR4 640

The best part of being over 55 is that my insurance cover has no deductibles per claim.

Indeed. Forgot that! Yes, paid £25 for that. There are discount deals available at various dealers. So my total would be £153 for the year. That's $205 USD total.

I'm paying total of £153 = zar 3148. Am I missing something here...lol.

That's still very good Andrew especially with breakdown cover. My car breakdown covers my bike so that's not been included in my figure. My car breakdown is very cheap anyway.

I have been known to say: "It isn't expensive, it's priceless."

here in sunny Ontario, Canada (smiling as I say that as I just rode home in friggin hail!)

250/year for insurance
96/year for licensing

canadian dollars so about 277 USD...

not bad really.

Registration and insurance costs for '15 GTS 300, Oregon, U.S.

Title and plate - $115 / one time only

Registration - $78 / every 2 years

Insurance - $180 / annually (liability, collision, comprehensive)

Here in BE (Belgium) for my Beverly 300 ie, on a yearly basis:

Road tax: 59,27€ (50,66GBP) (67,84$) (1039,84ZAR)

Insurance (mandatory liability + legal counsil): 284,04€ (242,77GBP) (325,11$) (4983,16ZAR)

So in total: 343,31€ (293,43GBP) (392,95$) (6022,98ZAR)

You know what? I do not care. I just love driving the BV.
And fuel and maintenance are more expensive.

You rode in hail? I had it once. Years ago, it was with the old BMW R75.
Not possible to ride in hail. The noise on your helmet, the hail hitting your throat.
I just looked for shelter under the canopy of a gas station and waited until the hail was over.

I've ridden in everything. including one storm which I didn't think was too bad until I came over a hill to find a tree down. So, up on the pegs, open the throttle and blow on through.

Jacket got raked up, got some serious air, but came through okay. good trick on a 53 Triumph with a rigid frame. (military bike) It pays to have ridden dirt bikes a lot! I found out later I was within a couple of kilometers of a tornado.

got caught in heavy hail once, new bike, beautiful paint... I hugged the tank to protect it.

I don't have a clue.

And I don't care.

My scooters make me happy every time I ride.

Whatever it costs, it is worth it to me.

Bill

I'm near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, USA.

Registration is like $21 per year.
Insurance is $38 per year.

So, fixed costs are $59 per year.

Fuel is about $4/ gallon right now, or about $1.05 / liter (or is that litre for you French-Canadians?).

Interesting. You either don't have many crashes or accidents in Penn state, or the moto theft and crime is very low.

That's what many pay per month here where I live.

Good on ya!

Surely this is only minimum required liability coverage - but it seems like a remarkably low rate for even that coverage.

Cheap! GBP1.45 here in the UK at the moment. $2/l or $8/us gall. And it's only 'liter' in the US.

Full coverage, but, that is one of 8 bikes insured with that company, so, definitely a multi-bike (single rider) discount.

Fuel tax is cheap in the US compared to most of the rest of the civilized world.
That said, the state I live in has the 2nd highest state fuel tax, so, fuel prices here are some of the highest in the US except California.

Renew plates $41/yearly x # of scooters
Insurance is running me about $200/year complete coverage on 4, 1978, 2016,2019,2021 and with roadside assistance/service which is worthless for most of the areas I ride in as there is NO place for 60 miles that is set up for dealing with a motorcycle or scooter

Ditto !

In California, I pay $210 per year for the license plate (tags) plus $315 every 6 months for insurance.

$840 total

You guys are lucky. For just 3rd party fire and theft I am paying about £400 a year on the GTS

Whereas the fully comp + UK & EU breakdown cover is GBP173 for my GT200 in the UK.

Johny, thinking you're very young or had a bike stolen or smashed? That seems quite a bit of money to me especially for third party fire and theft.

In Wisconsin it's more like $50 for 2-year tags, and I pay $110 each for my scooters for a full year of insurance (which, to be fair on both counts, perhaps accounts for the half-year riding season).

I pay $109 per year for my insurance in Baltimore.

Nope neither of those. I always use the comparison sites. My PX is much cheaper.

It is always difficult, and frequently misleading, to compare the cost of one person's scooter insurance to another's. It dependes on so many factors - your location, your age, your driving record, your financial situation, the kind of coverage you choose, eligibility for discounts, and so on.

Could it be because you live in London, where scooter theft is particularly prevelent. They do say that your postcode can make a significant difference to your insurance quotation.

It's just because it's a GTS - it's just so much easier to replace the throttle body with another one on them than changing the immobiliser bits on the GT, for instance. That's the main reason they're the favourite bike for the scrotes to half-inch.

Plus, having a bike garaged and having the maximum noclaims bonus makes for far cheaper insurance.

That is extremely cheap.
Pennsylvania is in the east. Pittsburgh in the west, Philadelphia in the east, close to NYC. I would expect it to be a more expensive state

That is quite expensive. Almost the double of my yearly cost (392,95$).

It is rare to find motorcycle or car costs higher in the US than in the EU. But maybe your fuel prices are very low to compensate?

Plates and tags is nearly $100 a year. Drop some insurance on that? Another hundy and change.

Running costs are moot in so far as I do the work.

But when you've got 11 bikes it adds up quick.

12 months rego and Compulsory Third Party Insurance = $288

We don't have any yearly inspections or such for 2-wheelers, insurance costs only.

There we have a mandatory insurance (covers costs for the other parties) and voluntary components for crashes, theft, fire etc.

Bonuses for 'good behaviour' are hefty, within a few non-incident years you'll typically pay ~30-20% of the max.

Power/weight - ratio is used by most insurance companies in the price setting, as well as incident statistics.

I'd quess an average quotation price here for a 300 GTS insurance is higher than Fud's yearly costs totally. With full bonuses goes below.

At the upper scale of the power/weight ratio the differences are bigger. Say, a 1200cc lazy Triumph Bonneville has probably half the insurance costs of a 1200cc higher power BMW.

BTW, I just checked again.
The insurance costs are applicable to my 2021 HPE.
The annual registration fee is the same.

I pay $20 annually to register each vespa, and $60 annually for MC insurance each

$80USD plus gas and maintenance