Insuring a second car

onomatopoeia99

As noted, some insurers will offer to mirror an existing discount on a second policy with them, but it should be borne in mind that if you decide to "switch" after one year, you will only have a year's entitlement on the second vehicle.

I run two cars and a (currently broken) van, each have their own policy with at least five years of entitlement built up on them.

iolanthe07

It can only be used on a second vehicle with the insurance company's knowledge and consent

Well Saga agreed without any problems at all. I assumed it was fairly universal. After all, insurance companies know that you can only drive one vehicle at a time!

dauphin

It would be dangerous for anyone to assume it is universal, although if you discussed it with Saga and they agreed, that's obviously fine. However, when you apply for insurance and answer the question about how many years NCD you have, the insurance company will normally specify that it must not be in use on another policy. Here is what Saga themselves say in their proposal form:

"This NCD must have been earned within the last two years and can only be used on one policy."

The argument that you can only drive one car at a time could not override the insurance company's stipulation about not using the NCD on more than one policy. It is not an argument that holds much water anyway - most people I guess have at least one named driver on the policy apart from the policyholder so it's entirely possible for 2 cars to be on the road at the same time. Or if you had 2 cars parked in your garage and the garage goes up in flames...

There will be plenty of examples on the Insurance forum here of people who have got into difficulty with their insurance company by assuming that an NCD could be used on more than one policy at a time.

iolanthe07

I've been doing a bit of research on this, and thumbing through my car magazine's insurance advertisements, it does seem as if transferrable NCD is often allowed where the second car is a 'classic' (however that is defined) and not the insured's main car, with mileage restrictions.

it's entirely possible for 2 cars to be on the road at the same time

Of course it is possible for both cars to be on road at the same time with two named drivers. But each car is insured under its own policy. I'm not talking about one policy covering two cars (though I believe that can be done). The same if they're both destroyed in a garage fire; they will both be covered by their individual policy.

dauphin

I'm not disputing that there are some schemes available whereby an NCD on the first car can be mirrored onto a policy on a second car. In the case of classic car policies, to which you refer, these usually have much lower premiums anyway and typically don't operate an NCD system at all. The insurer will usually stipulate that only cars older than a certain age can be insured under such a policy.

I've only been anxious to put across, in case anybody was misled, that applying an NCD to a second car is by no means universal, and certainly not something to which you are "entitled" as you put it, merely as a result of not having made any claim on the first car's policy.

To allow an NCD or not is a matter for the insurer, although if you are simply renewing an existing policy it will contain contractual provisions about its NCD scale. But if you are switching insurer, or taking out an entirely separate contract of insurance on another vehicle, it's entirely up to the insurer whether to allow an NCD. It can't be taken for granted.

I made the point about 2 cars (yes, insured under separate policies) being on the road at the same time because you seemed to be arguing that because you could only drive one car at a time, it somehow followed that the insurance company would automatically be happy to apply the same NCD to each. But perhaps I misunderstood what you were suggesting.

jimjames

I have 2 vehicles and a classic. The classic doesn't use NCB at all. The second car had same NCB as original car although when I got the quotes I gave the number of years NCB as zero some companies applied the full amount.

iolanthe07

to which you are "entitled" as you put it

Fair enough; I shouldn't have used the word 'entitled'. Your post gave me pause for thought, and I wondered whether I had inadvertently committed some sort of fraud. But I checked, and the second NCD was applied legitimately. As you say, it depends on the company and, presumably, what sort of history you have with them.

MobileSaver

Ant555 wrote: »

I didn;t like the idea of multi car - no rational reason and I am sure it suits many people

I was sceptical at first but soon changed my tune after I got a quote from Admiral; with five cars between two of us we saved a small fortune compared to insuring them individually. (The completely logical explanation for the significant saving being that although we had five cars we could only possibly ever drive two at any one time and indeed very often would only ever drive one [i.e. me driving, girlfriend passenger] so risk to insurer is nowhere near the same as 5 individual cars/drivers.)