Minor damage to car bumper

w00519773

I have some minor damage to my car bumper.  My car insurance policy has a protected no claims discount (15 years) and £0 excess.  Therefore I am thinking about making a claim.  I guess I should see how much t costs to repair and then do some price comparison searches with and without the claim and see if the difference is greater or less than the cost.  Have I thought this through correctly? Is there anything else I should consider?

400ixl

0% excess, or 0% voluntary excess with a non voluntary excess? Would be unusual to have absolutely no excess.

BarelySentientAI

Might a bunch of searches with and without a claim raise fraud flags at your renewal?

DullGreyGuy

w00519773 said:

I have some minor damage to my car bumper.  My car insurance policy has a protected no claims discount (15 years) and £0 excess.  Therefore I am thinking about making a claim.  I guess I should see how much t costs to repair and then do some price comparison searches with and without the claim and see if the difference is greater or less than the cost.  Have I thought this through correctly? Is there anything else I should consider?

what was the bumper damaged on? It's presumably a fault accident. Any damage to street furniture etc?

Insurers monitor what people put through quotes and then check what they buy so be aware what information you are putting into counter fraud databases. 

Insurers also ask about losses irrespective of fault and irrespective if claimed for or not. The difference between an unclaimed to blame accident and a claimed fault accident may be less than no accident -v- a fault claim. In theory you can no longer say you've not had any losses. 

Mr.Generous

You have to love a protected no claims discount, here's how it works. You get (say) a 70% no claims discount. Your policy would cost £1000, but because of the discount it's only £300.

You make a claim. Only £500, but hey, you have 70% NCD.

Because of the claim your renewal goes up to £1800. With your protected NCD you only pay £540.

Nowhere does it say you wont pay more. It just says you will get the same discount.

DullGreyGuy

Mr.Generous said:

Nowhere does it say you wont pay more. It just says you will get the same discount.

Absolutely correct, and 65%-70% used to be the maximum no claims discount but the majority of people have max NCD and these days most won't say what the % discount is and instead is more complex and generally not as big. 

Martyn_H

If it's minor damage, why not just pay out of your own pocket otherwise you'll need to declare any claims within the last 5 years when renewing?

w00519773

BarelySentientAI said:

Might a bunch of searches with and without a claim raise fraud flags at your renewal?

I guess it could.  I Googled it and that was what was suggested - the post was dated over ten years ago though.  I guess I would just have to explain (with evidence) why I performed two separate searches mid term.  Though tempted against this now based on what you said.

w00519773

Martyn_H said:

If it's minor damage, why not just pay out of your own pocket otherwise you'll need to declare any claims within the last 5 years when renewing?

Waiting for a quote from a local company.  If it is low (which I suspect it will be), then I think I will just pay for it.

BarelySentientAI

w00519773 said:

BarelySentientAI said:

Might a bunch of searches with and without a claim raise fraud flags at your renewal?

I guess it could.  I Googled it and that was what was suggested - the post was dated over ten years ago though.  I guess I would just have to explain (with evidence) why I performed two separate searches mid term.  Though tempted against this now based on what you said.

Explaining that you had an incident but are not choosing not to declare it because it would make your insurance more expensive would certainly be an 'interesting' conversation to have.  Would all depend if they ask about incident/loss (which you have had) or claim (which you haven't yet).

w00519773

I have spoken to the insurance company who tell me it is up to me whether or not I make a claim.  They also agreed that it was a good idea to compare prices from a price comparison website with and without the claim.

I have obtained two quotes.  The first was £200 and the second was £2100.  I was surprised by the difference, however when I raised this with the person who quoted £200 he said the price would be more like £2100 if I claim on my insurance.  Does anyone know why that would be? I don't know whether to specify the damage as £200 or £2100 on the price comparison website.