A heated November of protests lies ahead, called in Bilbao, Seville, Barcelona, Madrid and the Balearic Islands, and led by the roadside assistance companies the Alliance represents.
Finally, after four months of intense meetings between the National Roadside Assistance Alliance and insurers, motoring clubs and travel assistance platforms, the former has called a series of protests in the tow-truck sector, whose losses so far this year already stand at 63 %. The assistance sector is demanding that the prices of its services cover, at the very least, the cost of maintaining a 24h/365-day service.
The Alliance denounces how, while it accumulates losses, insurers announced 9.3 % higher profits in the first half of 2022 (2,662 million euros). The increase in fuel prices and insurers' failure to comply with current legislation are damaging the economic viability of roadside assistance companies, and therefore their service. Hence a series of slow marches has been called from different cities, which will converge on the capital, Madrid.
Bilbao, Seville, Barcelona and Madrid – as well as a city yet to be decided in the Balearic Islands – are the places chosen to launch the protests, which will take place in stages during the second half of November. The exact dates are still being considered. The Asociación Nacional de Empresas de Auxilio en Carretera (Aneac) will also take part in the marches, having signed a mutual collaboration agreement with the Alliance to form a common front against the insurers belonging to the Unión Española de Entidades Aseguradoras y Reaseguradoras (UNESPA).
Last October the sector already held a slow march, with the support and participation of the Alliance; on that occasion in favour of regulating the profession so that it can be carried out safely, which led to the negotiation of a new assistance regulation with the Ministry of the Interior.
"The sector will make itself heard," said the Alliance's spokesperson, Xavier Martí
The relationship with insurers is key to the survival of roadside assistance, given the evident abuse in the contracting of companies, mostly SMEs, which, if they continue working under these conditions, will be forced to close. In fact, they are receiving rates more than 40 % below the prices that would be appropriate to avoid technical insolvency.
Insurers, assistance platforms and motoring clubs are also failing to comply with the regulations passed last March on passing on costs arising from the increase in fuel prices. The Alliance's spokesperson, Xavier Martí, has described the situation as "critical", since "we are facing a devastated assistance market in which rates have been frozen for more than a decade". The abuses of insurance companies, Martí points out, and their "irresponsibility", cannot go unanswered. "The sector is going to make itself heard," he said. It is worth remembering that the Alliance highlighted the situation at a recent meeting with the National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC), in case insurers' behaviour might also constitute a breach of competition law.
The National Roadside Assistance Alliance is made up of the following regional and national associations and business organisations: ABEAC (Balearic Islands), ABEAC (Basque Country), ASCA (Catalonia), AMEAC (Madrid), ASCALEAC, (Castile and León), ASEDA (Andalusia), ASEGA (Galicia), AGRUAXA (Salamanca), ASEXTEAC (Extremadura), GRUPO CARTER (National), CEPAS (National), FEGRUAL (National Federation) AGREGA-GRÚAS and REAC (National Group).