Young Driver's Insurance

rosemary_hobday

Does anyone have any experience of Young Marmalade? Apparantly this can be a totally separate insurance to mine which will allow my son to drive my car with no effect on my insurance with Direct Line. Young Marmalade said that other insurers are very dismissive of their cover so I am worried that maybe there is reason to be. Also interested to know if they are regulated by normal bodies that control insurers.

dacouch

Its looks liken their scheme is underwritten by Zenith who in my opinion / experience are not a great Insurer.

The Policy excess appears to be £650 which is a lot to fork out in the event of a claim.

They are in effect a car leaser / dealer who offer an insurance scheme through Zenith. They are regulated by the FSA as an appointed representative

Julesx

In response to various posts asking about experiances with Young Marmalade I have made a summary of mine:

In August 2007, I bought a Fiat Grande Punto with all the trimmings from Young Marmalade. They added the insurance for the first year onto the loan so the loan amount came to £10,000 which was £235.00 per month. Cheap I thought for a brand new car and insurance. The delivery of the car itself was over a month overdue, I complained and they sent me the car the following week.

However, in June 2008 I was travelling at nighttime with my daughter to the doctors (she was 2 years old at the time) when I stopped at a roundabout and the car would not go into gear. I took it to Fiat and they repaired it underwarranty. They couldn't give me a courtesy car because they had none available and I had to hire a car myself to get to work and back etc. They also had the cheek to say I was lucky they were repairing it for free (?? nice).

I wrote a letter to complain to Young Marmalade, Alphera (who finance the whole scheme), Fiat and EMG (the dealership who Young Marmalade use to get the car from).

I recieved a letter from Alphera to say they couldnt' don't anything but if I wanted to end my agreement early I could pay the settlement figure (and pass the car onto some other poor person, I don't think so).

Young Marmalade sent me a one line response with no stamp on it which I had to collect and pay to recieve from the post office.

EMG have said my complaint lies with Fiat and Fiat basically said they didn't want me to write to them again.

After getting increasingly stressed I decided that the gear box had been repaired and to just keep on with the agreement for the 3 years and then I could just hand it back.

Then I got a warning light on my dashboard saying the airbags weren't working. I took it back to Fiat and they told me the problem was with the seatbelt and I had to have a full new seatbelt mechanism installed. Fiat loaned me the courtesy car for the full 7 days it took for them to rectify the problem.

Again, I tried writing to all companies. Alphera still won't accept my issues.

So I stuck with it and then in September 2009 I was crossing a busy junction when...........the gear box went again!!! Due to the jerking of the car and trying to steer clear of a possible collision I injured my back and had to take time off work with strong painkillers.

It took Fiat 6 weeks to get hold of a new gear box (they said there was none in England or Italy) the provided me with a courtesy car but I had to insure it myself as they wanted £20.00 per day for use of theirs.

I went to collect the car and got a quarter of a mile down the road and had to take it back. They told me they hadn't tighted one of the gears up and they had it for another 2 days.

I am now left with a stiff gear box, a car I am scarred to drive, I can't get a response out of Alphera (all they keep trying to do is make me part ex and refinance).

All I want to do is end the agreement and hand the car back which I think is resonable considering I have nearly been killed in it three times!.

I have written to the Financial Ombudsman, Watchdog and I have an appointment with my solicitor. I have even cancelled the Direct Debit in the hope that someone calls to ask me where the money is so I can speak to someone to resolve me issue.

I would think very carefully about purchasing anything through any of these companies again!!

maninthestreet

Cancelling you DD wasn't a good idea - you now will have a default on your credit record. Alphera are as equally liable as EMG (the dealer who supplied you with the car).

J400uk

^^
Hello and welcome.

From reading your post it sounds like your issue lies with Fiat, it has absoulstely nothing to do with Young Marmalade whatsoever.

At the end of the day, the car has a warranty so any faults can be fixed free of charge until its working again.

I presume you bought it on a PCP agreement? That means that once you have paid 50% of the finance off, you can hand the vehicle back without penalty.

iolanthe07

Very bad idea to cancel the direct debit, however upset you are. This immediately puts you on the back foot and gives them the advantage.

Premier_2

Oh dear, you really have gone about this entirely wrong as others have already mentioned.

They are not known as Fix It Again Tomorrow cars for nothing.

hartcjhart

rosemary_hobday wrote: »

Does anyone have any experience of Young Marmalade? Apparantly this can be a totally separate insurance to mine which will allow my son to drive my car with no effect on my insurance with Direct Line. Young Marmalade said that other insurers are very dismissive of their cover so I am worried that maybe there is reason to be. Also interested to know if they are regulated by normal bodies that control insurers.

are you on about 'young marmalade' or 'provisional marmalade',there is a difference