Car insurance - comaprison sites vs cashback

thedogman_2

Followed Martins good adice for car insurance, best quote from comparison sites = Esure £423 - sounds good to me.

A couple of the cashback sites are offering £45 for new esure policies, so this is now looking even better at £378 for the year (compared to my renewall offer of nearly £500!!!) but when I clicked on the links to generate a new esure quote, through the cashback sites, the price Esure offered me was far higher that through gocompare.com

In fact, by getting a new quote from esure from either cashback site, they were adding at least £40 to the premium, AND increasing the excess by between £50 and £150!

So beware of the cashback offers - it seems that, at least in this case, the vendor is taking that back out on the customer!

Anybody else seen similar?

serbask

I think it may be because the comparison sites make assumptions, and its when you put the exact details in the insurers site that the price changes. I'm pretty sure that the insurer doesn't know you came in through a cashback site, so wouldn't 'take it back' as such.

dwsjarcmcd

serbask wrote: »

I think it may be because the comparison sites make assumptions, and its when you put the exact details in the insurers site that the price changes. I'm pretty sure that the insurer doesn't know you came in through a cashback site, so wouldn't 'take it back' as such.

I actually think that the insurers have different rate sets for different distribution 'partners'. They do know if you came through you a cashback site and will set rates accordingly.

thedogman_2

dead right dwsjarcmcd - I checked the qoutes in detail, everything the same except the 'excess' choices were different (higher) and the cost was higher!
Clearly they know they are giving £45 to the cashback site, so just lump that straight onto the policy.

planetf1

I've been with esure for a fair few years - just taking the odd year out depending on offers, but they're consistency good value for me (and my wife). In the past (over 5 years ago) I've had a minor claim, as has my wife, and it was sorted quickly both times.

I had my renewal this week. A pleasant £217. No surprise that plugging the same numbers in as a new customer, and via quidco resulted in a £10 cheaper quote as well as a £50 cashback.

I then hit gocompare to validate that esure was still "right up there" (which it was), but noticed the quote was £20 cheaper. I thoroughly checked quotes side by side and the only difference was the cheaper quote *also* had £50 less voluntary excess

Of course I'm sure the quidco cashback would then not be paid as the quote wasn't done directly, so the c/b remains better value but it did surprise me - briefly.

Still not as good as my best ever quote a few years ago with prudential where I got free breakdown cover (full cover too) *and* £100 cashback - net cost little over £100 the year including b/down. Never repeated.....!

planetf1

Just a thought.
I'm assuming that if I
* Make an original esure quote via the quidco link
AND
* re-enter the site to retrieve a saved quote, via the quidco link

that cashback will still track?

Or is it recommended to do the whole quotation process in a single step?

dacouch

You would have to delete your cookies from your computer and then run it through Quidco, even then there is no guarantee of getting the cash back

deanos

Ive been looking at insurance tonight, Swinton was £300 direct and offered £40 c/b + £40 c/b from cashback site total £220 , but via go compare it was £203

Oh and when using comparason/insurance sites always use false details and enter you car manually, eg add a day to you date of birth and use a another street near where you live