Playing the car insurance game to get lowest quote in London

vaio

What is your OH's driving history? If she has been regularly driving without incident you might be able to swing some introductory discount, this is where a local broker might be able to help

Other than that you seem to have covered the bases, I’d be inclined to go down the old cheap car route and Admiral/Elephant to build some NCB.

People have reported problems with them but people have reported problems with pretty much every company so you might as well go for the cheap ones, paying £800 and having a problem is better than paying £2k and having a problem. I tend to treat it like another motoring tax but where I get some choice in how much I pay.

The big thing is that as a new London based driver any claim you make on your car is pretty much guaranteed to drive future premiums into the unaffordable bracket so get a car where if you scrape it on a post you don’t really care and can either repair it yourself/live with it/scrap & replace it so the claims service of the company doesn’t matter as you’ll never use it. The other advantage of this is that you can go for a really high excess which insurance companies like.

As you are hoping to pass your test fairly soon it might be worth getting an indication of how they will treat you when you pass. Some companies really don’t like newly qualified drivers so factor that into your choice.

cybergibbons

In that case - what's the best cheap, low insurance group car that has a boot big enough for a buggy and 5 doors?

I've only really had experience with K11 Micras, which I quite like, but the boot is tiny and the 5 doors are pretty rare these days.

cybergibbons

Interesting - just looked at the following cars:
2003 Fiesta
2000 Skoda Fabia 1.4 16V
2000 Ford Focus 1.8 (a few different ones)

And the insurance all works out to be the same - cheapest is £700 with Admiral, average about £1.1k.

So I thought I'd try the New Cee'd VR-7 1.4 with £500 excess... £623 for the two of us.

I'm sure that someone, somewhere can make sense of how a 113bhp, £12k car can cost the same as a 55bhp, £1000 car to insure. It must only be on the driver in our circumstances.

Thanks for your help on this, it's much appreciated. I now think we're going to go down the cheap but won't claim for minor bumps route!

mikey72

You'll find that cheap insurers when you are provisional will usually offer ridiculous rates when you pass, or just refuse to cover you. It's not unusual to have to cancel and re-insure elsewhere, so factor all that in when you get quotes.

bigjl

Insurance prices have gone mad in the last few months.

I renewed the wifes Clio, gone from three hundred to over 500, no fault claims, just one non fault claim, that was there when last policy was started.

I just renewed my Mondeo, cheapest I could get was £500, with 9 years NCD, advanced driver, car garaged etc. This car was mid £300's last time it was on my personal insurance.

A mate with a Honda Odyysey, jap import Shuttle, just got his renewal, has gone from £380 to £600, 12 years NCD, no claims, not even a non fault.

Personally I think the Insurered are trying to offset the calims in Australia after the recent floods etc.

I have never seen Insurane renewals like it.

Though I got a reduction when I added the wife as a second named driver, and got another slight reduction when I put down business use, though god knows why as it is hardly used in this respect but thought better to be safe than sorry.

I think there is a bit of premium reduction when you buy a new family sized car, perhaps the thinking behind it is if youhave anew car you are less likely to be careless, and the security is top spec as the car is new.

rev_henry

I'm with admiral. A similar difference comes up when I get quotes through the comparison sites - if Admiral went bust I wouldn't be able to afford to drive next time renewal came up! Never claimed, but experienced reasonably good service from them, personally £1200 is a ridiculous amount extra just because a few people on the internet said they had problems come claims time. Once you've a few years NCB and your licence then you can afford to be picky with insurance companies. My OH is on my policy as a learner (additional driver). I checked when I put her on, it only goes up by about £100 when (if at this rate!) she passes... They're not like Quinn ('Congratulations, that'll be an extra £900 please!').

fatbelly

vaio wrote: »

Other than that you seem to have covered the bases, I’d be inclined to go down the old cheap car route and Admiral/Elephant to build some NCB.

If you're using Admiral, go via Quidco for an extra £35 off.

Have you considered a Skoda Fabia estate? - lovely big boot, small cheap car, solid build, cheap insurance.