First Direct Car Insurance 10% guarantee

Sarahp5698

Tried using their website today, firstly it locks you out when you say you're a housewife as it does not give any details for nature of business.
I then phoned free phone number, only to be told that my postcode was classed as a high risk area, and they couldn't give me price.
This is first time I have ever been told we live in high risk area either for car or house insurance. We have always been told that we are in a good area.
Operator was very arrogant as well while literally telling me that I live in a rough area and would struggle to get any insurance.

larchard_2

Everything went fine for me last autumn. I was just over the £200 lower limit and the 10% off gave a price about 5% better than I found via MSE's search routes.

Then my wife followed earlier this year, but had big problems. She sent the renewal documents (also a bit over £200) but later got a letter saying they didn't have them, raising her price by an extra £600 and saying they would start proceedings to cancel. This was shortly before we went away on holiday to France (in the insured car) so we were lucky to see it before we went. Otherwise we may have ended up uninsured and illegal.

She immediately called them (actually Equity Red Star but branded as First Direct) and resent the documents, but they repeatedly didn't call back when they promised to, lost track of the issue, one person would say "All OK don't worry" then another that they were still cancelling. At one point we were packing for holiday and on two simultaneous calls, one with the call centre lady and another with her supervisor. We refused to hang up until they confirmed the documents, which we had now also faxed to them, were there.

In hindsight we would have paid an extra £100 to avoid the stress and several hours of chasing and dealing with all this.

We've been banking with First Direct since the mid-90s, almost since they began, which is pretty amazing as I ditch and switch just about everything else for a few quid. We've stayed because their customer service has been excellent. It was very obvious to us that this was not being operated by their own people and we almost resorted to calling the banking section to ask if they'd intervene on our behalf.

Please, First Direct, be very careful to protect your excellent reputation. If you allow your brand to be applied elsewhere, make sure you control the quality.

romfordboy

When I see these type of offers I ring up my insurance company and say "First Direct will beat your quote by 10%". Will you match its offer?". Invariably the answer is "Yes"'. Less hassle, no wasted time filling in forms, posting renewal notices. More importantly, not getting stuffed the following year with an inflated quote

therealdessie

They were the cheapest for me, but only because they guaranteed the undercut for like-for-like cover (and I should note I'm a FD customer but I don't think that makes any difference as they just use the FD name). I had serious issues with them however when they bumped the premium up (and backdated it) without warning, because I had previously been on a no-claims accelerator deal.

They claimed that I had only paid for ten months insurance previously so in order to cover me they would have to charge 12/10 of what I paid before. I explained to them several times by phone and letter that I had paid the value of a year's premium in return for ten months cover so that I could get the extra no-claims period, the value of the insurance was still twelve months. Eventually we had to go to the Financial Ombudsman (who were equally useless) but I did eventually get my money back. They were not the cheapest quote for renewal, but neither were any of the other insurance companies I looked at, if not for the guaranteed saving I would definitely not have gone to them - this year however the premium has only increased by £20.

I had to go for comprehensive cover in the end to make sure I had the coverage I wanted (including windshield damage), previously I had been on third party fire and theft only.

zatari

Great ... First Direct insurance