Car insurance from broker advice

ahsan

Hello members 

My car insurance is up for renewal and all the cheapest offers are from insurance brokers either selling directly e.g. Onecall, Budget etc. or BISL disguised as M&S, RAC, Santander.

are these ok to purchase i.e. from Onecall, Budget or BISL. Historically I have always purchased from insurance company directly like LV, Admiral etc.

I guess the issue for me is you don’t even know who the insurer is ? And probably God forbade if there is a claim then I assume you are dealing with broker who is dealing with insurer therefore added complications.

what is the best course of action - thank you for your help in advance.

tacpot12

You don't have to buy the cheapest. Buy from a company where you know who you will be dealing with. 

DullGreyGuy

A broker will state who the insurer is however some brokers only deal with admin of the policy and not claims at all whereas others have authority to deal with all but the largest claims. With the later who the underwriter is is broadly irrelevant unless you have concerns of their financial stability. 

PS Budget = Budget Insurance Services Limited AKA BISL

One Call also operate as an MGA (US terminology increasingly used in the UK) or Coverholder (traditional UK term) which is a step beyond the traditional broker or wholesale broker in terms of pricing or policy wording

ahsan

So top 10 or more comparison results for me are all broker ones. And quotes from insurance companies directly are £70 or more. My main question is if it’s ok to go with these broker insurance - I have done search on some of the names and people have posted negatively about them.

DullGreyGuy

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with brokers, like insurers there are good and bad ones out there. The barrier to entry is much lower making it easier for someone to get into the market -v- trying to setup a new insurer.

One area to be careful with is cancellation fees, if you realistically may need to cancel the policy early. In some cases you have both an insurer and broker fee