Home insurance - talking to an actual person

CaptainWales

Need to renew my home insurance. Currently with esure which seems to have moved to an entirely chatbot / online supoort model which is quite frankly rubbish and irritating. Also told me that they couldnt make any changes to my renewal policy due to a system upgrade but i could take out policy then make changes - no thanks!!

Im now looking for an alternative provider who i can actually speak with to discuss my policy needs and, should the need ever arise, a claim? Do such companies still exist or is everything now online? 

ginat_101

Yes don't make changes once you've committed.  That is their opportunity to penalise you next time.  My sister once called her insurers regarding a claim (it never materialised into a claim) but was still treated AS IF it was a claim and her premium was increased the following year because 'she had made a claim' - even though she hadn't.

CaptainWales

Agree. I fear that they will charge me for making any changes as well. 

Cressida100

I use SAGA with no issues. I have always spoken to knowledgeable people who don't just work from a script. Just checking online shows not everyone has had the same experience though. 

user1977

I expect claims are much more likely to involve real people. Flogging the policies in the first place is much more automated, if you fancy chatting to somebody you might be better with a broker.

DullGreyGuy

CaptainWales said:

Need to renew my home insurance. Currently with esure which seems to have moved to an entirely chatbot / online supoort model which is quite frankly rubbish and irritating. Also told me that they couldnt make any changes to my renewal policy due to a system upgrade but i could take out policy then make changes - no thanks!!

Im now looking for an alternative provider who i can actually speak with to discuss my policy needs and, should the need ever arise, a claim? Do such companies still exist or is everything now online? 

There are several "online only" brands but they tend to be very easy to spot as they make a big thing about the cost saving of not having thousands of call centre agents waiting to talk to one customer at a time etc. Maybe not on the Aggregator site but if you google the names of the companies it will be evident from their websites.

These companies are still in the minority and most insurers that have one also have telephone based brands too... Aviva for example sell a full service offering under their own brand and an online only under Aviva Zero and Quote Me Happy. 

lisyloo

Did you try something like "speak to a person" on the chatbot?

CaptainWales

Yes. And I did actually speak to somebody at Esure yesterday, after waiting for an hour to connect, only to be told that they couldn't do anything due to a system update their end. Not going to be fixed until 14 Feb at the earliest either. Pretty rubbish customer service - why not tell me that BEFORE I wait an hour to be connected?!

Weighty1

I recently left Sheilas Wheels (part of the same group) due to the same problem.  They couldn't even quote for some changes I wanted to look at upon my insurance renewing but said I could make the changes and after the plan had renewed.

I actually made a formal complaint about it, more specifically because of some of the things I was also told on the call basically being totally untrue and when the complaint handler called me they advised that if I had wanted to make some changes after the policy started that I could have requested the changes and if there were not cost effective I could then request the policy is cancelled and receive a FULL refund.