Tesco Car Ins giving me trouble pls help!!

Charlie1111 · 6 July 2017 at 12:55AM

So I recently signed up with Tesco. My previous insurance ran out in April. I was doing some work to the car, amidst trying to prepare for my new baby who will be here soon...to cut a long story short I had a delay in renewing my insurance, didn't know there was a problem with this.
Anyway Tesco said recently that I will have a problem as I should have declared it SORN.
I've declared vehicles SORN before and it was always necessary if the car was going to be off the road and untaxed....Ive never heard of this having anything to do with insurance!!

What's going on....Im so busy with other things and I could really do without this extra stress..
The car was still taxed with an mot.....i was just doing some servicing for a month and a half...
Oh God.....

Please if anyone can shine some light and help me id be very relieved.

PS....I did have insurance for 4 days with Adrian Flux but cancelled because I didn't like how their customer service dealt with me.....very rude they were...

antrobus · 6 July 2017 at 2:10AM

Charlie1111 wrote: »

So I recently signed up with Tesco. My previous insurance ran out in April. I was doing some work to the car, amidst trying to prepare for my new baby who will be here soon...to cut a long story short I had a delay in renewing my insurance, didn't know there was a problem with this.
Anyway Tesco said recently that I will have a problem as I should have declared it SORN.
I've declared vehicles SORN before and it was always necessary if the car was going to be off the road and untaxed....Ive never heard of this having anything to do with insurance!!

What's going on....Im so busy with other things and I could really do without this extra stress..
The car was still taxed with an mot.....i was just doing some servicing for a month and a half...
Oh God.....
Please if anyone can shine some light and help me id be very relieved.

PS....I did have insurance for 4 days with Adrian Flux but cancelled because I didn't like how their customer service dealt with me.....very rude they were...

What kind of problem do Tesco say you have?

Continuous Insurance Enforcement has been in force since 2011. It is an offence to keep a vehicle without insurance unless it has been SORNed.

I don't know whether or not the DVLA (or whoever) will retrospectively fine you now that you have actually insured the car. But you have committed an offence. Fixed penalty of £100 I believe. Worse if you get caught driving an uninsured car.

Quentin · 6 July 2017 at 6:04AM

Before you get any fine for no insurance under the continuous insurance rules you do get a reminder/warning that your car needs insuring

If you never had one of these you probably are not going to hear anything more (assuming you are now insured)

stator · 6 July 2017 at 12:55PM

Unless he gets a CCJ at his old address.

Charlie1111 · 7 July 2017 at 9:25PM

Thanks for the reply's. Well I haven't been living under a rock but I am 40 years old and have never heard of this continuous insurance law that came along 6 years ago.
Obviously I know you can't drive an uninsured car, but I've only ever known that if your uninsured car is kept off the road it is ok, unless it is untaxed thus needing a SORN.
I've asked a fair few people the last couple of days and they're as surprised as I am to hear about this law.... I did read as you correctly state, if someone has a vehicle that isn't SORN then they're notified by dvla that they should have insurance. I never received such a notice. How were drivers informed of this new law? Shouldn't the dvla have written to every owner of a registered vehicle to let them know....
Clearly this is an innocent mistake on my behalf.

Well the young man from Tesco's said that this has happened before and usually the policy holder loses their no claims bonus. A tad harsh in my opinion. Nevertheless he gave the opinion that I'd still be able to keep my policy but have to foot the bill and pay the difference...still quite harsh I might add... and unfair for someone who clearly just didn't know about it.
The car was up on axle stands whilst I was installing new brakes, discs and other servicing etc.....

Anyway I received an email from Tesco just saying that my policy will be cancelled in 7 days.

I've got my first baby being born in 2 1/2 months, I've got a home to prepare...My most recent priority was get the car fixed for the baby arrival...and until recently I had thought that job was out the way and onto the other things.....

forgotmyname · 7 July 2017 at 9:35PM

They did inform every owner, when your tax renewal came through it was on there.

And now it clearly says your tax is not tranferable.

rs65 · 7 July 2017 at 10:06PM

Charlie1111 wrote: »

Well the young man from Tesco's said that this has happened before and usually the policy holder loses their no claims bonus. A tad harsh in my opinion. Nevertheless he gave the opinion that I'd still be able to keep my policy but have to foot the bill and pay the difference...still quite harsh I might add... and unfair for someone who clearly just didn't know about it.

.........

Anyway I received an email from Tesco just saying that my policy will be cancelled in 7 days.

None of this makes sense.

Ask them to explain exactly why:-

you would lose NCB
what difference you are expected to pay
why they are cancelling

Charlie1111 · 11 July 2017 at 2:21PM

Well the Tesco chap said that it happens every now and then, and Tesco usually just do as I said and change their NCD to zero. Perhaps it's a way to make some more money from the customer..... but unsurprisingly from everyone I've spoken to lately, nobody has heard of this law! And they're all drivers of various ages...mostly between 30-70.

And replying to a further comment, I've never actually renewed any tax. I've mostly driven company vehicles or with my most recent car I've changed vehicles before the year ran out so put one car on SORN (for having no tax) and bought tax for my newer car.
I recently sold a car that I had on a SORN for 11 years....previously I had to renew the SORN yearly but that changed some years ago to it being automatically renewed......so I've never kept a my own vehicle on the road long enough to renew my tax.

Well....Tesco is proposing to cancel my insurance by tomorrow so I will make the call to them today. If they are still set on cancelling then I think it best to cancel myself before they do so I can avoid having an insurance cancellation on my record....Jeez things are so much more complicated nowadays..

I wonder how much of my £650 I will receive back for having my car insured for 1 month.....

rs65 · 11 July 2017 at 8:20PM

Charlie1111 wrote: »

Well the Tesco chap said that it happens every now and then, and Tesco usually just do as I said and change their NCD to zero. Perhaps it's a way to make some more money from the customer..... but unsurprisingly from everyone I've spoken to lately, nobody has heard of this law! And they're all drivers of various ages...mostly between 30-70.

There is no law about NCD. If Tesco reduce your NCD to zero for this, then use another insurer.

Quentin · 11 July 2017 at 8:57PM

You look to have spoken to a new starter

You earn ncd for not claiming! And only lose (some) of it whenever you make a fault claim.

You won't get any NCD for the part year you have been covered before the cancellation.

But this cancellation does mean bad news for you.

Insist on them explaining in writing why they are taking this action and complain if you feel you are being treated unfairly

Tesco Car Ins giving me trouble pls help!!

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