Insurance Comparison Quotes - Searching my credit record

pimento

I've been getting some quotes for car renewal insurance over the past week or so with the usual sites (Confused, gocompare, that sort of thing) and I received an email from CreditExcpert this morning saying I had new alerts. RBS and Churchill Insurance searched my credit record even though I haven't contacted either of them regarding the quotes they gave that appeared in the list of possible quotes for my car insurance.

Is this usual? This is the second year running these two have done this. Why is this? I've never had car insurance with either of these two comapnies and I pay all in one go (not instalments) so am unsure why they would need to check my credit anyway.

Is it worth a phone call to tell them what I think, or am I wasting my breath?

dunstonh

Is this usual?

yes.

This is the second year running these two have done this. Why is this? I've never had car insurance with either of these two comapnies and I pay all in one go (not instalments) so am unsure why they would need to check my credit anyway.

They check to see if they can offer monthly terms or not.

Is it worth a phone call to tell them what I think, or am I wasting my breath?

You agreed to it. So, you are wasting your breath. You cant really complain about something that you agreed to in advance.

pimento

Small print, eh?

I did tick the box that said "I pay annually" and not the one which said "I pay monthly" and why are they the only two of the several dozen who quoted to search?

huckster

An increasing number of Insurers make 'quotation' searches on credit records, as part of their processes. These searches can only be viewed by you and do not affect your credit rating.

The searches are done for a variety of reasons and not just to see whether they will offer monthly payments. Reasons include, combating fraud, money laundering.

If you visit the Insurers online sites, you will find details of how they use these credit record searches. You can also phone or write to them to ask for an explanation.

dunstonh

Small print, eh?

Buy a larger monitor

The problem with T&C is that you want it to be short but then you get so many people who complain about insignificant things that they then have to add clauses to the T&C to cover those points. So, the T&C gets longer and less likely to be read.

However, confused.com don't have too much on their site and their text is pretty big. http://www.confused.com/corporate/privacy-policy - see the two entries regarding credit searches.

I did tick the box that said "I pay annually" and not the one which said "I pay monthly" and why are they the only two of the several dozen who quoted to search?

Not all companies do it. Some do. Its up to them really. Personally, I dont see the point of doing it until you agree to proceed as a search costs the company. Ok, they may get it cheaper than I can (although mine is heavily discounted on the normal charge) but I think its wasteful but that is their choice.

pimento

OK, thanks for explaining. If it doesn't affect how the financial world views me, I'm not so bothered.