It looks like the various insurers who were unable to find the new Bonneville Bobber on their insurance database have finally pulled their fingers out and have updated their systems at last. There may still be one or two who haven't yet... and we've managed to find out exactly why this has taken so long.
Usually, when a new model comes out, Triumph (or any manufacturer in fact) issue the relevant specifications for the machine to the ABI and get an ABI Code (or codes if there are more than one model in the range) for the machine. This is the identification code for the specific model on the ABI database and is done a month or more in advance to when the model will start to end up in customers hands.
Then it's up to the insurers to set rates and update their databases. Usually this isn't a problem as the insurers can set rates relative to the previous model or a similar machine. At least that's the theory.
Apparently the Bonneville Bobber was considered so different from other models that the insurance underwriters couldn't easily set a risk level - and there weren't any previous models to go on either. So they had to do quite a bit of research themselves which took longer than the usual amount of time. As a result they didn't manage to set insurance rates until after customers were trying to insure their machines.
We've been assured that there will be no repeat of this for the Street Triple 765 models which are due out in the first week of April.
