Aviva Car Insurance Pay Monthly Credit Check

JGUK

Hi All,

Just noticed this wording on Aviva's pay monthly terms and conditions;

"Aviva is a responsible provider of credit, regulated by the Consumer Credit Act, and we take these responsibilities seriously to ensure our customers are able to meet their monthly instalment commitments. In keeping with this, you agree that the status of your quotation search footprint will change to reflect your application for instalment credit and will be visible to other credit providers."

Am I right in thinking that they list the insurance as an actual credit account and if you press accept an actual credit search akin to a credit card will be done and then the account will be posted like that ?

Seems very OTT for a simple insurance monthly payment, seems like Aviva and their sister companies/online brands are the only ones who do it.

Its also quite muddled because QuoteMeHappy/GeneralAccident/etc etc go on about just showing a quotation search which they have on good authority that it won't affect your credit file then they stick that disclaimer right next to the accept button - all a bit sneaky IMO.

daveyjp

Why is it OTT. Someone applying for a credit card may get an initial limit of £1,000.

Car insurance can be £2,000+.

If I were lending you £2,000 to be paid back over 12 months I'd want to make sure I had a good chance of getting it back. A credit check is one way of doing this.

JGUK

Well,

Beyond the minefield of wording that makes it almost impossible to actually figure out what they might actually be doing.

I'm not sure your analogy stands, you're a single lone person lending another person £2000.00 - someone not paying you back that money might hurt you quite a lot, Aviva are the largest insurance companies in the UK with profits nudging over £3 billion last year. So the comparison isn't a great one in my eyes.

Also if no other insurer in the UK does this on a structured monthly repayment plan for insurance, why should they? Just seems a bit draconian and extreme to turn pay monthly insurance into a full credit type product.

Quentin

It's the norm. (Who told you only aviva do it?)

When you buy your insurance on the drip it's a loan.

You are applying for credit and will only be accepted if you are found to be credit worthy

JGUK

From looking at other insurers, none of them hard credit check you for paying insurance monthly, Aviva & Partners are the only ones that do.

Can you point me to any other insurers that do a hard credit check when you accept the monthly premiums instead of just quotation searches?

Quentin

As posted it's the norm

JGUK

I'll politely disagree, but thanks for your input its appreciated regardless.

rudekid48

You are not buying monthly insurance. You are borrowing the money to pay for an annual policy which you then pay back monthly. No different to any other loan or credit.

[Deleted User]

Aviva report to the CRAs as well as run hard checks. I think all insurance and utility companies should.

JGUK

Yeah I mean the minute I saw the wording I just paid outright - however as I said, I'm not entirely sure that I've ever seen monthly paid insurance appear as a full blown credit product before and I find it a bit cheeky that it has become such a product.

Some might say you're paying month by month for insurance much like other types of insurance which aren't delivered in that manner.

Was just a bit sneaky, if you read the wording too for example here;

https://help.quotemehappy.com/media/1079/important-information-about-credit.pdf

Says nothing about a full application search but then on the actual page to process right at the bottom it infers that it will happen.

I guess we all have different opinions on how such a service should be provided, I think insurance is overpriced to begin with, so I think a monthly payment solution like for example road tax, break down cover or other similar things would be good.

Anyway as I said just found it a bit sneaky and as far as I can tell after looking around for a bit only the Aviva Group do a hard search for the monthly premiums - no other big provider seems to.

Quentin

Other motor insurance providers do credit check you if you want a loan to pay your premium monthly.


Aviva let you know now, others will let you know before carrying out the check - giving you the opportunity to pay in full if you don't want the check done.


All explained in this MSE article:


http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/insurance/comparison-site-credit-score