Saga home insurance leaping from £300 to £719.84 & due in 3 days - no emails about renewal

ChrisM78

Hi, I oversee finances/bills for my 85 year old mum with dementia. She's had buildings only insurance for her property (a small house) which has been just over £300 for the last few years. I've asked them not to send her any post as that will only make her anxiety worse. 

I see this morning from receiving an email that they seem to be automatically renewing her home insurance (due on August 8) which I've previously stated that I'd rather manually deal with any renewal. The main shock for me is the amount due is £719.84 - a ridiculous rise. No claims have been put in re home insurance. 

I would usually receive an email a month before stating that renewal's coming up, but I received nothing. They've been sending home insurance letters to my mum, but I know she won't open them. 

Saga couldn't give any reasoning for the huge jump in pricing. I'm not very well health wise at the moment so it's a bit overwhelming - not too sure what to do about it right now apart from an email to the CEO. 

MyRealNameToo

ChrisM78 said:

Hi, I oversee finances/bills for my 85 year old mum with dementia. She's had buildings only insurance for her property (a small house) which has been just over £300 for the last few years. I've asked them not to send her any post as that will only make her anxiety worse. 

I see this morning from receiving an email that they seem to be automatically renewing her home insurance (due on August 8) which I've previously stated that I'd rather manually deal with any renewal. The main shock for me is the amount due is £719.84 - a ridiculous rise. No claims have been put in re home insurance. 

I would usually receive an email a month before stating that renewal's coming up, but I received nothing. They've been sending home insurance letters to my mum, but I know she won't open them. 

Saga couldn't give any reasoning for the huge jump in pricing. I'm not very well health wise at the moment so it's a bit overwhelming - not too sure what to do about it right now apart from an email to the CEO. 

Shop around and see if you can secure appropriate cover for a lower price. 

No call centre agents are able to see the pricing algorithm and even less likely to have any views on it for an intermediary like Saga who have several insurers with different pricing on their panel. Even if they could all they would be able to say is the rating for X has gone from 0.75 to 1.5, the rating engine wouldnt contain why the answer X has had its factor doubled. 

Robin9

Have you got any alternative quotes ?      Then email CEO to match it ?

I assume you have LPOA for your mum.

(I think even £300 is excessive)

Annemos

Just to note I am not an Expert, but here are my comments. 

Insurance Renewals are so very stressful when this happens. 

Saga only gave me 5 days-notice when they sent me my new renewal policy (which had NO Subsidence cover any more). And I was already in the middle of a Subsidence Claim. 

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I cannot comment on the 3-year Contract issue. 

One thing you can do is submit a Formal Complaint to them about late notification, if you can cope with drafting that. (See Complaint Contact Details on the Policy). And e-mail would do. 

They are not responsible for the actual level of your Mother's quote, as that is down to the Underwriter. I wonder if they are deeming your Mum to be more of a risk? 

But if they have not made enough effort to get the renewal out in time, then you may be able to get about 70 pounds compensation out of Saga (the Broker), like I did in 2020 (maybe a bit more now!).

I suppose it would have to have been made very clear to Saga that they should be notifying your own and not your Mother's contact details. 

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Just another thought I have had .... from my own experience. 

What I might be inclined to do in your case is contact Howden to discuss a new policy. Howdens were very good at getting a Policy set up for the unoccupied house of our Mum when she finally had to go into a Home for Dementia. 

If you think that may be an issue that is quite soon coming to a head, then maybe it would be good to get someone like Howden on board already? They also have many offices in towns, too. 


https://www.howdeninsurance.co.uk/

Best wishes to you and your Mum getting a new Policy. 


Update... very good point from Robin9 about the Lasting Power of Attorney. 

MyRealNameToo

Robin9 said:

(I think even £300 is excessive)

What are you assuming the value of the property is? 
What is it constructed from? When was it built? Is it listed? Have they had 3 claims in the last 2 years?


Not sure how you can deem what is expensive and what is cheap based purely on the statement it's a small house. To some a 2 up 2 down is a small house, to others a 4 bed house may be small. 

It's certainly high compared to the UK average but it's also a policy will more of the bells and whistles than a standard policy. They also didnt state if it includes AD, LE, Home Emergency etc which all can add notable amounts

dunstonh

I see this morning from receiving an email that they seem to be automatically renewing her home insurance (due on August 8) which I've previously stated that I'd rather manually deal with any renewal. 

And you still can.  Auto-renewal doesnt change that.

The main shock for me is the amount due is £719.84 - a ridiculous rise. No claims have been put in re home insurance. 

Are you suggesting nobody has claimed on their home insurance and the insurers haven't had to pay anyone?  After all, pricing is based mostly on the collective and not the individual

Saga couldn't give any reasoning for the huge jump in pricing.

The people you can speak to are not trained on the reasons why and have to stay within there largely scripted range of answers.

not too sure what to do about it right now apart from an email to the CEO. 

And after several months of that, what change do you think it will make?  Saga are not an insurer but a broker.  

If you don't like the price then you change to another if you feel that offers comparable cover at a price you do like.  That is what everyone else does.   There is nothing to be gained by writing letters.

ChrisM78

Robin9 said:

Have you got any alternative quotes ?      Then email CEO to match it ?

I assume you have LPOA for your mum.

(I think even £300 is excessive)

The potential spanner in the works is that I'm not exactly sure what kind of locks my mum has anymore or if she has locks on the windows. To cut a long story short, my mum was very insistent on me applying for LPOA 6 years ago. Unfortunately, I am not in direct contact with her anymore, owing to the level of verbal/psychological abuse (which had been going on for years) from her becoming so bad 30 months ago that I genuinely wanted to commit suicide (it's not fun waking up to 15 voicemails of pure hatred every day). 

Is the locks situation something that can be updated at a later point with the insurer or not necessarily that important? I also can't remember exactly when my parents bought the property but have a rough year - same goes for when my mum moved over from Ireland, but she's been here since around 1962...

Re looking for a quote tonight, it's pretty clear that much better deals are to be had...

MyRealNameToo

ChrisM78 said:
Is the locks situation something that can be updated at a later point with the insurer or not necessarily that important? I also can't remember exactly when my parents bought the property but have a rough year - same goes for when my mum moved over from Ireland, but she's been here since around 1962...

Locks make much more difference to contents than they do buildings but yes in principle they can be updated later. 

You say you've been buying her insurance for years so why not just look on the schedule of last years policy which will state what the declaration is? Unless she had her doors/windows changed in the last year it'd be unusual for someone to change what type of locks (if any) they have fitted. 

No insurer asks when you bought the property, they ask when it was built. If you dont know that then some online home insurance system will estimate its age automatically (eg confused.com). I'd check it and the neighbours each side, if they are all the same and presumably a similar looking building then it's probably fairly accurate. 

ChrisM78

No info re locks on the Saga policy. 

MyRealNameToo

Have you found the schedule from the current policy? Normally it would list all the answers to the questions asked at quote stage as they require you to confirm they are still accurate each year as they cannot rely on generic questions like "has anything changed"