HOUSE INSURANCE renewal with RIAS

Barnaby

Hello, a general house insurance question.

I have just received my House renewal insurance from RIAS. 
Last year it was £161.08, the Renewal for 2024 is £202.55 approximately a £40 per year increase.
Previously the Insurance company have said I must ring up to enquire to get any reductions to my renewal but this year they are saying they are not giving any discounts so don't ring us.
Now £40 spread over a year is not much being about 80p a week and probably not worth my effort/time searching for a better deal.

Is this the way ALL insurers will be going in the future no haggling allowed.
I wonder what the MSE Forum thinks of this.

Best regards.

DullGreyGuy

Insurers used to heavily discount new business and inflate renewal business to compensate, this gave some wriggle room on renewal business (else customers just got a new business quote and bought that instead). 

That practice was banned last year, there was speculation on what that would mean for pricing... would it average out, would new business just come up to renewal costs or something else. With one years worth of data now insurers can probably be more sure of their pricing but it still means no one is paying OTT and so there isn't the fat still there to offer discount off of. 

It will never be the case that its never worth it, if you are going via a broker they may be willing to give up some of their commission or they may be able to downgrade you to a lower product or remove some optional extras etc... not all "discounts" were achieved simply by reducing the price.

Due to poor claims experiences over the last few years it was predicted Home insurance will go up 30% this year (Car by 50%) so you seem to have done slightly better than the market average. If you decide its worth it for 10p a day its up to you

Barnaby

Thanks for your expanation DullGreyGuy.

For this low-ish cost increase I don't think it is worth me looking for a better deal.  I find it difficult to be sure I am comparing like with like.
I am a little worried that this "don't bother to haggle" statement will just allow them to increase year on year leaving me with the only option of to not renew with them.

DullGreyGuy said:

, if you are going via a broker they may be willing to give up some of their commission or they may be able to downgrade you to a lower product or remove some optional extras etc... not all "discounts" were achieved simply by reducing the price.

They didn't even try with any of that only repeated that they were not currently offering any discounts and that the price offered was their best offer.

Regards

400ixl

You should always look at the whole of the market for a better deal.

Go to the comparison sites to start with (you can also go to brokers and insurers not with comparison sites), you can replicate most of the information to get a starting position, but also adjust to what you need now as everyones requirements change over time. If you find a company that looks competitive, click through to them and then go through the details of the quote again (not everything translates through from the comparison engine so best to check it all).

If there is one cheaper then you can call your current supplier to tell them not to auto renew as you have found cheaper elsewhere and it is up to them if they want to engage on their price.

This is how insurance renewals should always be conducted and there is nothing new there.

[Deleted User]

Hi,

no harm done using Go Compare  for comparison, they search for cheapest quote.

DullGreyGuy

400ixl said:

You should always look at the whole of the market for a better deal.

I wouldn't necessarily agree with such a statement as you do have to factor in how much your life/time is worth... 

To go through the whole Home insurance market would take days to do and personally I value my time more highly than that. Even just going through a couple of aggregators takes hours... our insurer requires only items over £12,000 to be listed so thats what my list contains... Confused.com wants every item over £1,000 so that would take a significant amount of time going through the Mrs jewellery collection and double checking how prices have moved since earrings etc were gifted/bought... saw one insurer the other day asking for anything worth more than £500. I can be almost certain even without entering the first keystroke that someone who needs items of that value specified is either going to decline or give a crazy price. 

I personally wouldn't just auto renew but neither am I going to go to the extreme of checking the whole market and ensuring every MGA and other popup intermediary has been spoken to.