Car insurance win non UK no claims

andycris3107

I've just returned to the UK having lived overseas for 15 years (EU).

I'm now looking at buying a car and am having issues with insurance. None of the online companies that I have seen allow for no claims history gained outside of the UK. My wife and I have always had a car fully insured and have full no claims. Without this the insurance quotes are horrendous.

Does anyone know of any companies that do allow for non UK no claims or any other means that I can obtain a more realistic quote?

I am mid 40's, 22 years licence including HGV, Bus, Motorbike. Looking at the quotes you would think I were a 17yo joyrider.

I'm amazed at how expensive motoring is in the UK.

Car_54

Hi

Forget online quotes - they don't cater for anything out of the ordinary. And don't phone the companies - their call centre staff know nothing!

Your best bet is to try some local brokers and speak to someone who actually understands the business. Avoid Swintons.

Good luck!

Turn_to_Grey

I agree. A broker is the way to go. However, our insurer while we were in the EU was based in Gibraltar and while one insurer declined the NCD on return to the UK, another decided it was OK. Luck of the draw maybe.
But see a good local broker. ( Not Swinton ! )

InsideInsurance

Several insurers will consider overseas NCD as long as you can get a letter in english on headed paper from your foreign insurer. If you look at https://broker.aviva.co.uk/help/faq/answer/1304/ you can see Aviva's recommendation to Brokers on it.

One of the aggregators, think its Compare the Market but could be wrong, even allows you to enter the fact you have an overseas NCD

I'd also disregard the above comment about call centre staff being useless. I agree that they arent always the best trained people in the world but the advantage of call them is if they say they will accept it then there is little the insurer can do to back out of that if the statement is incorrect. It can certainly work to your advantage at times

andycris3107

Not sure what the issue is with Swintons - not that I was going to use them but is there a reason they should be avoided?

I seem to recall that Compare the market does allow you to indicate non UK no claims but when I tried there was little or no impact on the final price. Additionally despite selecting the 'I don't want to be contacted' option these guys bombarded me with emails and calls after I used them.

I'll look for a local broker and see how they fare.

InsideInsurance

andycris3107 wrote: »

Not sure what the issue is with Swintons - not that I was going to use them but is there a reason they should be avoided?

They are the boogeyman of the forum. They have historically had some fairly sharp practices and heavy sales techniques etc

AdrianC

TBH, I've been quite pleasantly surprised by Swinton over the last few years, but there y'go. Really, you're down to good old fashioned phoning around and seeing who'll either take account directly or at least give you a marketing discount roughly equivalent. It's going to be a long, slow process. Good luck.

iolanthe07

I had this issue when I returned from the USA. It is no good trying anything out of the ordinary online. As Car 54 states, go to a broker - that's how I got a reasonable quote and no claims in the US taken into account.

dacouch

AdrianC wrote: »

TBH, I've been quite pleasantly surprised by Swinton over the last few years, but there y'go. Really, you're down to good old fashioned phoning around and seeing who'll either take account directly or at least give you a marketing discount roughly equivalent. It's going to be a long, slow process. Good luck.

Swintons have a £7.4m fine for aggressive / miss selling and more recently former directors were fined £1m and banned from working in the financial service industry.

Quote from the FCS enforcement officer regarding the recent fine.

"A culture was allowed to develop within Swinton that pushed for high sales and increased profit without regard to the impact on the firm’s customers. We expect firms to put customers at the heart of their business. These three directors should have recognised the risk to customers and redressed the balance so that the drive to maximise profits did not jeopardise the fair treatment of customers."

specialboy

Used swintons a few times over the past 5-10 years and had no problems whatsoever, in fact I recommend that you at least try them before discounting their services.

knightstyle

These people sorted it out for us after 16 years abroad. You will need proof os overseas NCB.
https://www.stuartcollins.com