Never accept renewal quote

grabagrannie

Martin was recently on a programme where he showed that, if you pretended to be a new customer, you got a lower quote than your renewal quote.
I would like to know how you do this, since as soon as you start to give any information, it will flag up that you are already a customer. You can't give a false address or car registration, unless you are very clever and know the registration of a car identical to yours in the same area.

ACG

price comparison website?

InsideInsurance

grabagrannie wrote: »

I would like to know how you do this, since as soon as you start to give any information, it will flag up that you are already a customer.

The majority of insurers and brokers systems are not this sophisticated yet and do return new business quotes via the web for existing customers (though a few do)

forgotmyname

SAGA are one that flag up that you are a customer already and the system says see your renewal. Parents were with them

So i added a letter to the address 1a instead of 1 and put the reg of an identical car off the net.

Quote came out a lot cheaper. They phoned them and they said they could only offer that to new customers. Cancel the renewal and take out a new policy and that price wont work.

They went elsewhere.

Lots of companies dont have systems like that.

EdGasket

If your renewal is with Admiral, get a quote from Elephant and vice-versa. They belong to the same group and will match the other companies quote.
You can also enter something slightly different, like your name, DOB, or address then do the quote as soon as it will let you. Then phone up the company and give them the quote ref and price but say you had a typo on the name or address or whatever you had to enter differently, and ask them to correct it. If they refuse to match the quote, just say you'll leave and take out a policy as a new customer at the lower rate; thats just what I did with Liverpool Victoria. Daft really as it is more work for all concerned but they should not rip off existing customers to pay for their marketing campaigns for new customers.

ACG

This all seems like a lot of effort just to stick with a company who are prepared to charge you a lot more than if you stuck with them.

Would you stay sat in costa coffee if your first coffee was £2 and your subsequant coffees were £5 or would you cross the road and go to starbucks?

bsms1147

ACG wrote: »

This all seems like a lot of effort just to stick with a company who are prepared to charge you a lot more than if you stuck with them.

Would you stay sat in costa coffee if your first coffee was £2 and your subsequant coffees were £5 or would you cross the road and go to starbucks?

To continue your analogy, if Starbucks were £4 a cup to start with, and all I had to do to get £2 coffee again at Costa was to walk out of their door, turn around and walk back in again as a new customer, I'm sure I'd put in that little effort for the cheaper price.

ACG

what about if you had to walk out put a wig on and some glasses and call yourself lisa and then walk back in?

Just_Some_Guy

This is a laziness tax and is a consequence of price comparison websites. Insurers now game their quotes to appear at the top of a list and anyone dumb enough to renew gets hit with large increases to subsidise new customers.

thor

Not true for all companies though. I was one who kept changing insurers for many years in a row as there usually was a policy somewhere cheaper(with added bonus of a cashback) until I got a renewal notice from esure. I got a price cut with my 1st renewal and a slight price increase a year later with the 2nd renewal. In both occasions when I checked quotes elsewhere, nobody came within 40% of the renewal price so I am more than happy to stay with them.
Sadly I know that this is probably quite rare generally.

squack

the best price will often come after you have been on a price comparison website, and one of the insurance companies then rings you up to try and get your business (usually they will only bother if they came out as one of the cheapest 3 companies to quote you)

They will run through your details and if you are perceived as low risk, they start knocking money off, especially if you tell them a white lie that somewhere else quoted you quite a bit cheaper than they really did, and when they beat that price, you say you are not sure and can you send out the info, they will then come up with a killer deal to make the sale

this way you can save more than the cashback would have been if you just did it all online, i just did it and was surprised how much they reduced the quote

also if you have more than one vehicle but only 1 no claims bonus, they can often do you a deal where, by providing proof of the ncb, but without having to use it on the other policy, you will get an additional discount to reflect your driving experience