Renew car insurance - pays to haggle!

pixelchick10

I got my renewal quote £247 fully comp - didn't seem too bad and was tempted to just renew but like all of us short of money at the mo, so got online. The best quote was via AA (£217) but wasn't keen on the insurer (although was keen on the courtesy car that's supplied if you've had an accident) - rang back my existing insurer, said I wanted a courtesy car and a cheaper quote - they gave me £210 - well i took that cos cheaper than all the other online quotes, but possibly they might've gone down a tad further. Just goes to show, it pays to haggle - have saved £37 just in a phone call and got a better deal on the policy.

fedupwithcrap

Good one, true MSE.

I was insured with Highway through Aurotrader last year. I was paying approx £24 a month and they wanted £38 per month this year(paid monthly as changed to car allowance from company car and wasnt sure on income this time last year)

Called up and I said too dear, they said can do for £414 if I pay in one lump sum. Yeah, right still too dear

Shopped around and got same level(fully comp business and leisure etc) for £275

No contest. Do these companies not want to keep customers(no claims so no problem there)

FlameCloud

fedupwithcrap wrote: »

No contest. Do these companies not want to keep customers(no claims so no problem there)

Its not that- its that the majority of policies these days is sold at a significant discount in the first year, meaning that renewals will almost always be more expensive.

Quote

fedupwithcrap wrote: »

(no claims so no problem there)

Well, quite. It's amazing how brilliant insurers are when you don't need to use them.

I can almost understand why people want to save money. I'm familiar with the sentiment that if you look after the pennies the pounds will look after themselves. That it all adds up. Believe me. I know. But at the same time I'm consumed by the overwhelming notion that the only thing you can actually do with money is spend it. This and the fact, The Fact, that we'll all be in the same place one hundred years from now.

Why on earth at the moment does there seem to be this futile desire for people to want to sacrifice peace of mind or pleasure or need or their future, all in the pursuit of cheapness? It's because television advertisement breaks are saturated with evidence of this cheapness. And these adverts propagate the idea that the cheapest version of an homogenous product must automatically be the best.

I'm sure that part of the reason I think like this is because I sell something that people have to buy. They have a legal obligation to buy it, and it's something they never want to have to use. Like buying a coffin. Also the perception of the consumer is that despite there being literally hundreds of companies offering a similar type of product, the misconception is that the products are identical. There is, no doubt, an element of truth in this, but only in the same way that a television set lets you watch the same channels. In all other ways there could be a wealth of differences. I could understand it if the thing I was selling was wholely useless, but it isn't. And yet people continue to want to s(h)ave inconsequential sums of money at the expense of quality.

£365 is one pound a day. £50 is less than one pound a week. Some people spend that much on satellite or cable TV every month. Since when did securing your livelihood have to be forfeited at the expense of what's on television?

Please don't answer that.

People like to think that they have found a bargain. They're proud of the fact that they can save money, even better if they can save more money than you. But people lie as well. All the time. They lie about how much they earn, how much their children sleep at night, and how much they pay for their car insurance.

The internet is also blameworthy.

I use the internet. True. But I'd never use the internet to buy insurance. It's far too complicated and there's no-one to blame if you click the wrong link, or leave the right box unticked, it takes too long to sort out and that's time you'll never get back. Ever.

And that's me. That's me with years of insurance and internet experience. I'll use the internet to buy a CD. I know the name of the artist, I know the name of the album, I know it has ten tracks on it, it's a no-brainer. But that's only on the occasion that I'm prepared to wait. If I want to find out how long I need to roast a joint of beef so it's well done there's any number of places on the internet I can garner that information. But I have to know where to draw the line. And that line is common sense. It's knowing my limits. This is why, with the aid of the internet, I might be able to self-diagnose coeliac disease, but I'm not about to conduct my own biopsy, no matter how good the diagrams are.