What is wrong with offering cashback deals for car insurance

cashbackdeath

All insurers pay a commission to website owners via an affiliate program. So why are insurance removing the ability to pass some or all of this commission back to those who purchase via their websites?

We used to pass back to clients around £3,000 per day from "Direct Line" and others but now it seems that all insurance are shutting it down by terminating cash back websites.

Direct line are one of the biggest payers giving a commission of around £75 per policy sold, forget what they say in their adverts, so why if this is shared with clients is it such a problem?

Giving cashback saves you real money of between 50-100% of the commission. Now, it seems all big insurers, HSBC and MoreThan just terminated today, especially now when we all could do with a break are they killing off these websites.

Let's face it the commission is paid anyway so why penalise less greedy website owners?

I say buy Tesco or Asda at least these guys have not pulled the plug so vote with your mouse. Buy from those who still offer cashback and teach the fat cats a lesson!

They will soon be back desperate for cashback sites to sell their products but at least people like you and me will get something back. :beer:

dacouch

Apart from being Spam, you must have a limited knowledge of Insurance if you are recommending people buy Tescos Insurance if you have a beef with Direct Line. Look up who underwrites the Tesco Policy.

Spam Spam

dacouch

How ironic..."Car cheap cover insurance UK is vehemently anti sapm. Any correspondence that you receive other than a notification or alert has not come from Car cheap cover insurance UK. As such any other correspondence should be regarded as spam".

http://www.car-cheap-cover-insurance-uk.co.uk/legal_disclaimer.php

dacouch

Perhaps your FAQs could include another question / answer...

We do not display our FSA registration number because we are not registered with the FSA

rudekid48

They don't display FSA status because they are nothing more than a marketing company. Here they are http://www.silvertap.com/clients.html with a list of their clients. I wonder if their list of clients know that they are reduced to forum spamming?

To all of the Insurance people on the forum, if you happen to get approached by this firm from Norwich offering to drive traffic to your website for a fee, you now know how they will do it.

Knowing how brand concious people like Tesco & Hastings are, I wonder how chuffed they would be to know that one of their marketing suppliers are spammers?

raskazz

The reason why insurers are pulling from cashback sites is fairly obvious. Such sites attract the type of customer who never renews their insurance, instead searching for the cheapest deal with the biggest cashback. Hence why (as a lot of posters here have found), many insurers offer markedly higher rates to customers arriving via cashback sites.

They would much rather deal with affiliates who provide quality leads which result in long-term business.

cashbackdeath wrote: »

They will soon be back desperate for cashback sites to sell their products but at least people like you and me will get something back. :beer:

I wouldn't hold your breath.

Ian_W

QUIDCO don't seem to have encountered these problems - at least not yet!

raskazz wrote:

They would much rather deal with affiliates who provide quality leads which result in long-term business.

But are those who go to insurers from comparison websites like GoCompare (love the ads), Confused, Moneysupermarket etc more likely to be "loyal" to an insurer than those who go from cashback sites?
And perhaps equally importantly why do some insurers seem more intent on grabbing "new" customers with initial discounts rather than rewarding existing ones with some form of loyalty bonus?

Astaroth

There is also the issue over liability.

A normal affiliate can only present the advertisment banner as it is given to them by the insurer. They are not allowed to otherwise encourage people to select that insurer as they are not authorised by the FSA to do so (in most cases) and therefore liability would rest with the insurer not the affiliate for any miss information thats given out or FSA advertising guidlines not followed.

Cashback sites therefore present a problem as they are providing financial insentives to people to buy insurance from particular insurers. Some insurers are therefore finding this uncomfortable within the FSA guidelines and don't want the liability it can create. Quidco is different because it is FSA registered and therefore able to take on the liability for its actions itself.