AA Membership Renewal - Stand your ground!

Tin-Foil_Trilby

Simon 7685

Thanks for info, I have just renewed a long running AA membership, after reading your post from March 2013. renewal quote was for £239.00, I have ditched some options that I would never use, and mentioned online offers to new customers, I now have practically the same cover for £101.00. any more tips?

Minerva69

My AA policy is due for renewal but I can get equivalent cover with the RAC at over £100 cheaper. I rang the AA and spoke to a frankly very rude and abrupt call centre operative, who refused to match the RAC's price. He said their cover is better because they provide legal advice. I pointed out I didn't need this anyway because I have legal advice included with my car insurance. I said if they weren't prepared to match the RAC I would cancel, so I have. They've just lost a customer because they wouldn't negotiate.

pc1271

With all of these yearly contract things, if they can't be bothered to offer the best price at renewal, I can't be bothered to haggle. 9 times out of 10 I just switch and then call them to cancel. I doubt they'd ever match the new price + cash back anyway.

pc1271

Rain_Shadow wrote: »

My father died in March. His AA renewal was due a couple of weeks back. My mother needed renewed cover. I called to renew Roadside and Relay or her. I was told c.£125 (cant remember the exact figure). I baulked and 'talking to the manager' yielded a 20% reduction to just under £100. This was the 'final' offer. I pointed out that RAC were offering the same cover to new members for £78.99. Another consultation with 'the manager' reduced the 'final offer' to £80. I took that.

I wonder, are these people ever the "manager", or just passed to another operative to continue the charade and convince you to accept.

Angelina1

Had renewal quote from AA for £239.48 for joint cover. RAC are doing the exact same cover for £145. So called to cancel, they reduced the price to £144, so have renewed with AA.

I did not even ask for a discount, just said it was to expensive.

KikkerToo

Just read this thread before calling the AA to cancel my renewal. They brought down the price from £46.12 to £34.00 for basic Roadside/Silver membership.

As I've never had to use them (touch wood) still wanted to cancel.

They then offered me free 1 year , 1-call out cover!

If your car is regularly serviced and fairly reliable- just having this piece-of-mind is perhaps all you need.

Crabman

KikkerToo wrote: »

They then offered me free 1 year , 1-call out cover!

If your car is regularly serviced and fairly reliable- just having this piece-of-mind is perhaps all you need.

Welcome to MSE :hello:

Be warned they will have asked for your card details so they can automatically take payment for a policy in 12 months time.

Ratboy

£230 for AA cover? Blimey!

When you insure your car, you get 'free' breakdown cover?

If you buy a new car, breakdown is included?

But in this day and age, where carburetters (sp) and points were involved in the past, is it likely a modern car to fail?

So why not save money if the above don't already cover it, and if you break down, join then, and at that they will most likely just tow you off the motorway, to fix at your own expense, as vehicles don't have 'simple' faults, repairable at the roadside.

If a modern car has a sudden fail, then it is something that the AA/RAC cannot do, all they will do is tow you. So cheaper not to use them.

loopdaloop

Simon7685 wrote: »

I wanted to share this experience with others and hopefully everyone can learn to haggle for the best deals. Sorry its a bit long but I wanted to get all the detail in, to show persistence can pay off.

I received my renewal last week for this years AA Breakdown cover. I have roadside assistance and relay. I have learned to haggle with them each year but this time it was different.

My renewal cam with the news that thanks to my loyalty they had awarded me GOLD MEMBERSHIP:j............
Unfortunately they also hiked the price from £6.83 a month to £12.34:eek:

So I checked online and the same cover was £80 in one payment or £8.00 a month, so £16 for the privelage of paying monthly in advance. I also checked RAC who offered £79.99 or £8.08 a month but with the sweetener of £10.10 casback and £50 of free fuel. Armed with all this info I mounted my crusade..........

I advised I was not happy with the price quoted and was told they could bring it down to £9.81 a month because I was such a good customer. I politely declined and advised it was only £8 a month online including the levy for paying monthly in advance. She said to me "I don't think it is, you have got that wrong!"........
So I advised her that I had the information on the screen in front of me. She said she would check and then conceded I was right. So she offered to match the price.
I again declined and advised what I could get from the RAC including the free fuel. She then advised me that the £50 free fuel wasn't free fuel as you had to go online to claim £12.50 a quarter!!!!!!
I advised that £12.50 x 4 = £50.00:rotfl:
She again conceded the point.

Tired of all this I said if they were not prepared to go lower, baring in mind I have had no call outs for 4 years then I would cancel. Her reply was that did I not realise that my gold card meant I could have 7 call outs a year instead of 5? So I told her that as I had only had 1 call out in the last 4 years, I was unlikely to suddenly need 5 never mind 7, especially as I only do about 3000 miles a year.
In desperation she then said well if I accidentally put deisel in my tank they would give me £100 towards the repair costs. I advised that I believed that was highly unlikely and still not worth the price hike. She then said well it is impossible for us to go lower because our overheads in coming out to you have increased.
Yawn, Yawn, I reminded her that I had not had any call outs and their only costs to me were sending me the shiny new card every year and taking my inflated monthly payments. I then said look if you aren't going to cut a deal I will cancel now. She said I needed to give 30 days notice, so I gave her due notice and told her to send out cancellation notification. I then asked for a number to ring up to complain about the terrible attitude they had towards existing customers and she gave me a number, then the call ended.

I rang the second number and went through the whole process again after complaining about the AA's lack of loyalty towards their customers. I also asked how they could justify a near 90% increase. She said that when customers had more than one call out they often increased premiums as those customers were an increased cost to them. When I said I had only had 1 call out in 4 years she said "OH", I then suggested that if that was the case then customers who didn't have call outs should receive a reduction, or it was discrimination:D

She asked for my number and if she could call me back, so I agreed. Within 5 minutes I got a call back and she said if they reduced my monthly payment from £6.83 to £6.17 would I consider staying with them? I said I would, so agreed to stay. Yes I could have jumped and still gone to RAC for the free fuel but I also appreciated the better level of service I received on this call and the willingness to negotiate. Also staying for another year, I think will put me in a better position for next years negotiations....

So I managed in the end to go from £6.83 down to £6.17 after being initially being advised of £12.34 for the renewal. This is the 4th year I have haggled my price down and I am now paying less for 2013 - 2014 than I did in 2009.

So be prepared to cancel if you threaten to, stick by your guns, moan like a good un and you might just get a much better deal:beer:

It's off to do the same with the car insurance next month when they put that up by a silly amount. Last year I managed just over £300 off the price but you have to be persistant!!!

The way they calculate based upon call outs is interesting .
They say to gold members they will increase the number of 'free' call outs, yet if you use them your premium goes up for the next year. They are therefore not free.

The retention guy went into a spiel that the AA were not insurance, which left me wondering why they do calculate on past call outs.
Either way, I cancelled yet they renewed me anyway!
To all reading this be really careful!

loopdaloop

pc1271 wrote: »

With all of these yearly contract things, if they can't be bothered to offer the best price at renewal, I can't be bothered to haggle. 9 times out of 10 I just switch and then call them to cancel. I doubt they'd ever match the new price + cash back anyway.

I agree, it's ridiculous having to haggle with the likes of the AA, I only realised they were this sort of company when I did. Of receive my renewal pack and they transferred me across to retention department. I then searched this website and surprise surprise!