Car insurance coronavirus

lopsyfa

DUTR said:

lopsyfa said:

DUTR said:

lopsyfa said:

DUTR said:

boulton1111 said:

my daughter Currently has her 1st yr insurance with a black box and we took out an 8000 mile policy. Due to the virus my daughter hasn’t used her car and clearly not going to use all her miles. There was a lesser policy for 6000 miles which was considerably cheaper. Now 6 months into her policy is there any recourse or action I can take to maybe getting some sort of refund? Anyone else tried to do this? 

The difference in mileage varies very little in my experience eg around £20/1000miles per annum, more importantly though, what if the situation had meant she would now do 2000 miles more than predicted?

Not for most, if not all, black box policies. Also, if the situation has meant the daughter will be doing 2000 miles more the insurer will be demanding more payments or they cancel the policy.

The advice is to call the insurer and ask if to ask if there is any rebate if the mileage of the policy is reduced. Some insurers will let you do this online and give you the extra cost or rebate before making the changes.

We cannot predict the future (only prepare as we believe) , the policies aren't to drive up to a certain limit.
There are tolerences on the mileage, I know when I've looked at policy invitation, having to low a guestimated mileage can detrimentally harm the premium.

Estimating annual mileage is not rocket science - not even similar to predicting the future. If the mileage was estimated at the beginning to be 8000 and we are already in lockdown for 7 weeks and likely will be in some form of lockdown for the next 3-5 weeks. That is about 3 months in 12 months and that can form the basis for reducing the mileage. 

You stated before that the OP won't be offering to pay more if the mileage had been 2000 more but fail to acknowledge the insurer will be asking for more. I guess the policy invitations that you looked at are not black box policies because the ones I have seen, the mileage makes a significant difference to the policy premium. Once you are about to reach the limit, you need to pay for extra mileage allowance to keep the policy. 

Also the OP already confirm reducing the mileage makes the policy significantly cheaper, so no point arguing that.

I guess it is how the message is perceived, I don't know about them asking for more money (I don't have a BB policy) I do know though that say I put I was doing 7K PA but I over the last 3 years were doing say 20K PA and then had to make a claim, then the insurers may have something to say about that. 
If I put 9K and done 9100 say, little or nothing would be said as there are tolarences.
Indeed part of the policy risk includes mileage, whilst the car is not driven, it is still subject to risk of collision or theft.

For any reason after the lockdown, there may be cause to increase the average mileage, there probably won't be holidays abroad (or minimal), so the owner may decide to drive from one end of the country to another for a break . 

The policy period is not over.

For a normal policy I will agree with you that mileage effect will be minimal. The black box policy is there to specifically to measure the risk in terms of driving behaviour and annual mileage. There is a fixed part of the premium and the other part will vary large with the mileage.

DD265

If it's a significant difference in price, it's worth asking the question of the insurers. The danger is if there are other factors that would cause the premium to go up in the mean time. For example, when I got married, which I understood to typically mean lower risk and therefore premiums, I faced a 10% increase in premium - no admin fee, no claims/incidents in the 4 month period from the policy start date, no other changes. Admittedly I argued the toss and they didn't charge me the extra.

The other consideration whether OP's daughter will do more mileage than normal after restrictions are lifted and still make it over 6k; for example, we've not seen family for a while now so I anticipate more trips back home than usual in a given period when we're able to do so - having had a reality check on priorities and all that.

Kattekwaad

I would suggest that she will be a greater risk when lockdown ends as she won't have been driving for an extended period.

Dr_Crypto

There is going to be an excess of RTAs as more people get back on the roads. Many people haven't turned a wheel for weeks and those who have been driving are used to almost deserted roads and some very high speeds. I've even seen much more frequent running of red lights on my commute. 

lopsyfa

DD265 said:

If it's a significant difference in price, it's worth asking the question of the insurers. The danger is if there are other factors that would cause the premium to go up in the mean time. For example, when I got married, which I understood to typically mean lower risk and therefore premiums, I faced a 10% increase in premium - no admin fee, no claims/incidents in the 4 month period from the policy start date, no other changes. Admittedly I argued the toss and they didn't charge me the extra.

The other consideration whether OP's daughter will do more mileage than normal after restrictions are lifted and still make it over 6k; for example, we've not seen family for a while now so I anticipate more trips back home than usual in a given period when we're able to do so - having had a reality check on priorities and all that.

I agree but the reason for the price rise may not be any reason to do with you, it may just be because you are no longer entitled to new customer discount and most insurer can now charge more because they aren't competing with price from comparison website if you bought the policy that way. I have just renewed one of our policy and admiral quoted £480 on one of the comparison website and I decided to see if it will be cheaper buying direct from them since they won't need to pay the moneysupermarket anything. But same policy direct with Admiral was coming out as £650 (I double checked and all the infos are the same) so I was forced to go through the comparison website.

I have also reduced the mileage on the second car from 8000 miles to 6000 miles and got a rebate of £30 with 5 months remaining. This policy was the Axa and have no black box - Axa lets you do this online without any cost and you can see the price before submitting the change. 

KimJongUn88

Andy_L said:

KimJongUn88 said:

452 said:

KimJongUn88 said:

I’m actually in a similar position. I bought a pair of shoes around 6 months ago. Due to lockdown l, I’m not going to wear them as much. Does anyone know whether I can get a pro rata refund from the shop I bought them from?

Look on the bright side, being low mileage you'll get more when you part ex them for the next pair. 

Unfortunately, they're on PCP so I won't get the benefit of the low mileage.  I'm just going to hand them back.  

What? Just walk away from the deal?

Indeed.  The finance company can foot the bill for the disparity between the current market value and the GFV...