Ocatagon car insurance

27Man

I had my car insured through Octagon over the last year.I thought I would renew with them for another year-but have found it very difficult and have given-up because of atrocious service .I rang their 0844 tel.no. at least five times over the last two days-and had to wait for a long time to get through and had to listen everytime to useless chatter, select options and could not even make a complaint about the poor service both online and by telephone. It seems they do this purposely to make money from your enquiry.
They appear cheaper than others but I dread to think what would have happened if I needed to make a claim-probably nothing.My advice is AVOID this insurer at all costs;
Has any one else had similar
experience of this company:( ?

DigForVictory

Happily limited, but check your renewal notice carefully in case they have logged incidents that you hadn't when hiking through the screenscrapers....

Eldsmum

I chose Octagon solely because they gave the cheapest quote. Unfortunately during the year I had two non-fault accidents and Octagon were a nightmare both times. Octagon don't keep you updated, they don't answer the phone or respond to emails. You have to chase them up with everything which is extremely stressful and inconvenient.

Octagon were dishonest to me about claiming the cost of my baby car seat, telling me it wasn't their policy to pay and instructing me to recover it personally from the third party's insurer. It actually states in the insurance policy documents that they will pay up to £250 for a child seat. I had to threaten them with the Ombudsman and received a cheque the next day.

My second accident involved a woman driving in to the back of me and she accepted liability immediately, there were witnesses and the police also said she was at fault. Octagon have dragged this out for months and reduced my no claims bonus to 1 year so when I switched to LV my premium increased by £130. The woman who hit me had a courtesy car and settlement quicker than I could get through to Octagon on the phone! Fortunately Mazda dealt with the vehicle damage aspect of my claim so I only had to notify Octagon but they still are still taking an unfeasibly long time to resolve the No Claims discount situation and the car seat costs.

Other issues:
The Octagon solicitors sent me someone else's personal medical details in the post
My insurance certificate showed the wrong car
The Octagon description of my claim states that I hit the third party in the rear when I was hit in the rear.
I had a letter to say they had received notification of an accident that I had not reported. I reported it immediately.
In my first non fault accident I had to pay my £750 excess and didn't get it back for six months.
I had to send documents 3 times because they kept losing them.

I am now with LV and they are a vast improvement simply because they answer the phone.

georgiasmum

these people are terrible