Car Insurance Article Discussion

Steve_xx

Hersh wrote: »

Evening all,1st time posting on here,seen a really nice 2005 VOLKSWAGEN POLO 1.4 for sale,I'm 24 turning 25 next month, and going to be a first time buyer, spent a few hours today looking at insurance prices for fully comp and the prices are way higher than I imagined.
The city has one of the highest rates of insurance, but some of the prices have been way above what I had imagined, the cheapest so far has been 2,749. Has anyone got any ideas on how I can get this price down to a reasonable level.

I think you might struggle. Your age is against you I reckon. To be frank, you ought to be looking at a smaller engine size if you want cheaper insurance. You don't say how long you've been driving and how many years no claims you have?

Hersh

Steve_xx wrote: »

I think you might struggle. Your age is against you I reckon. To be frank, you ought to be looking at a smaller engine size if you want cheaper insurance. You don't say how long you've been driving and how many years no claims you have?

I passed in 2005, this would be my 1st car that I'd be driving. I've looked at other cars but most have a lot of mileage on them and the ones I have seen are in poor condition and reading reviews on polo's and how good they are for a 1st car and especially at the price I've been quoted makes it ideal

Steve_xx

Hersh wrote: »

I passed in 2005, this would be my 1st car that I'd be driving. I've looked at other cars but most have a lot of mileage on them and the ones I have seen are in poor condition and reading reviews on polo's and how good they are for a 1st car and especially at the price I've been quoted makes it ideal

OK I see, so then you have not as yet built up any no claims.

Again I would reiterate that you look at a smaller engined car and you will fnd that it will come at a lower premium. Now I know this may not add to your street cred, but it will cost you less. You should also pay attention to the cost of taxing it. Smaller engined cars like mine only cost £35 a year to tax.

My niece is just 23, she's been driving for 12 months. Her first premium on a little Toyota Yaris was £1350. I've just sorted a premium out for her for the second year with Aviva I think and it was £750 with a limit of 5000 miles. This policy is unusual as it's for 10 months. But then, providing she has no claims within the period she will gain another years no claims after just 10 months.

steven10162

Car Insurance is in a dark place just now. Most insurers are looking at ways to get more money out of us.
In March last year the woman next door reversed into my car while pulling out of her drive. As my car was parked with nobody in it at the time this should have been a straight forward claim.
The car was repaired without too much fuss but when I came to renew my insurance it had gone up by about £100.
When I phoned Elephant to ask about the increase they said it was to do with the accident I had last year. A no fault claim had been noted in my file and this would have an impact on the quote I was being given.
Elephant say that because I had a no fault claim the statistics say I am more likely to have a fault claim within a year. What garbage!
The good news is that not all Insurance companies think a no fault claim is such a big deal. So do what I did tell them to get lost and shop around.

nikkicantfind1

:(Well i'm seething at the moment :mad: got the renewal in and it's gone up £100 rang them up to enquire why and was told that i'd made a claim...yes someone crashed into me while I was parked up and yes an honest person admitted it gave me their insurance details name address and telephone number. That was back in August 2010 and only now they tell me that they claimed it on my insurance instead by mistake. Now after 2 full days of telephone calls they are doing all they can to try and claim the £220 off the third party and close the file after they had to re-open it so they can remove the at fault claim off my insurance and give me a new renewal price before it's due in march. How can they allow things like this to happen, I contacted the lady that hit us today she hasn't heard a thing and even offered to pay us cash and even gave me her policy details to try and speed things up.

MIKELSOK

Just spent hours and hours and hours, looking at car insurance price comparison sites, and car insurance reviews from consumers on what their experiences has been when claiming.

Will the motor insurance company act fairly and equitably? or will they when faced with a fair and honest claim try and reject the claim. This after all is what we all want to know and the information out there on this very topic is very scant indeed. The biggest issue that seems to come across is that when one does have to make a claim the majority of the cheaper end of the insurance market companies drag their feet, employ rude and incompetent staff and you end up having to do all the chasing through their premium rated phonelines etc.

Like many I have noticed my renewal request to have increased by approx 25% and I haven't made a claim for over 10 years at least. It all leads me to think perhaps I should get the cheapest quote if I am driving a 7 year old car around that isn't worth that much but is perfectly road worthy and then at least I will be legal.

On the other hand if I own a £20K BMW my priorities are somewhat different, I need to be assured of fair play and a decent payout if I am making a valid claim and not in the wrong etc.

The bottom line here, is that IMHO, this country's insurance industry is a complete mess as far as protection for the consumer is concerned from what I have researched so far.

There should be IMHO minimum legal standards like;

1. A minimum time to respond to all claims by all insurance companies.
2. A banning of all premium rated phone lines used by insurance companies that keep you hanging on and on and on.
3. A guaranteed response to your call, ie when a company promises to call you back they do just that.
4.A guaranteed method of claims resolution without having to go to the Financial Services Ombudsman that can I understand take up to 2 years!!! before it is considered.
5. Mandatory Publication of claims settlement and dispute statistics by each insurance company on their web sites. Nearest independent info I have found is
http://www.willtheypay.co.uk/ very useful site.

At the end of the day price is only one of the factors, if you are expecting good customer service and quite rightly so then we need to be able to quickly enforce that and to date it is sadly lacking by so many companies. (Rant Over):mad:

lowId

Hi all, Great website and great advice around..
1st post, and a very complicated question,hope I can get some advice. I am 33 not from the UK and have been driving in Africa since I was 18 had insurance with a local company back home, and probably have a NCD for 10yrs+ no previous claims. Moved to the Republic of Ireland (not the UK but EU) and drove with insurance and a full Irish Licences since Nov'08 my policy expires next week and I am buying a group 18 car and moved to the UK, Best quote I got was 899£ they only recognized my 2 years NCD from Ireland? bearing in mind when I 1st insured in the republic they didn't even ask me for my old NCD and just gave me a great discount based on occupation(doctor) and age I think?? used to pay 300£.
What do I do?any advice please.

deebee

just upgraded my car to BMW X5 - called Tesco Insurance to update, additional charge as I expected (as I had a golf previously), but they say it has to have a 'tracker' for them to cover against theft! checked online, and cost for this is around £180, plus a £120 per year subscription! what a rip off as car has full immobiliser, has anyone been in a similar situation and found insurer who does not require tracker? thanks in advance

dacouch

lowId wrote: »

Hi all, Great website and great advice around..
1st post, and a very complicated question,hope I can get some advice. I am 33 not from the UK and have been driving in Africa since I was 18 had insurance with a local company back home, and probably have a NCD for 10yrs+ no previous claims. Moved to the Republic of Ireland (not the UK but EU) and drove with insurance and a full Irish Licences since Nov'08 my policy expires next week and I am buying a group 18 car and moved to the UK, Best quote I got was 899£ they only recognized my 2 years NCD from Ireland? bearing in mind when I 1st insured in the republic they didn't even ask me for my old NCD and just gave me a great discount based on occupation(doctor) and age I think?? used to pay 300£.
What do I do?any advice please.

Try speaking to a local broker (Not Swintons) as they might be able to get your African driving experience taken into account.

Although £900ish for a grouo 18 car is not that expensive

dacouch

deebee wrote: »

just upgraded my car to BMW X5 - called Tesco Insurance to update, additional charge as I expected (as I had a golf previously), but they say it has to have a 'tracker' for them to cover against theft! checked online, and cost for this is around £180, plus a £120 per year subscription! what a rip off as car has full immobiliser, has anyone been in a similar situation and found insurer who does not require tracker? thanks in advance

X5 are very popular with professional car thieves and have a very high rate of thefts.

Professional thieves will often target this type of vehicle by breaking into the house to steal the keys. With this method a vehicle immobiliser is useless hence the requirement for a tracker.

You can often get better deals for a tracker if you pay a larger upfront cost that avoids the annual subscription cost.

There are some Insurers who will not require a tracker on an X5 but their premiums tend to be more expensive

I would recommend that you think carefully about where you keep your vehicle keys when at home to reduce the chances of a "Millenium Burglary" (The name for this type of theft).