Home Insurance Cost Cutting System/MoneySavingExpert.com Discussion

chloejane_2

well im very happy thanks to this site just had renewal through from abbey for £353 and went to insurance supermarket, got a lower quote then went to abbey online put detail with higher figures as realised very underinsured needed double what we had last year, quote through for £250 which was lowest around savings of £100 and doubled the insured amount!

alanobrien

Well my renewal time is here for buildings & contents and while i am not totally priced obsessed i do expect to get a reasonable deal from hunting around and comparing cover.

This year the insurer i have been with for some years, Sainsbury Bank decided to increase my premium by some 20% over last year :eek:

Why? presumably because some people let them get away with it I guess. Anyway frowning on the idea of paying £462 i did the usual supermarket / confused tango and come up with a price for the same cover from halifax of £276 :j and from Esure of £320.

Interesting that Halifax consistantly come up in this thread as the cheapest, are they having some kind of push for new business i wonder ?

Anyway the last part of the tango involves talking to a broker and haggling with your existing insurer.

The broker i can see may be worthwhile but would anyone really expect an existing supplier to drop their renewal quote by approx 40% ?

Anyone have any experience of a company dropping this much ?

alanobrien

Further to my last post now i know sainsburys bank are having a laugh.

I just entered my renewal details into their website for a quote and it came to £347.15 which is £114 less than they want from me to renew. Madness.............

bisto282

I work for LLoydsTSB home insurance in Bournemouth, we shop around a panel of 9 companies for you, its generally very cheap for all ages. If you want a good deal, I can sort you out.

bisto282

Halifax are a very good insurance company. They will do you a good deal for the first year ( 30% off or so? ) but, the following year the insurance will increase, them thinking, as you got a good deal last year you wont shop around again and you'll stay with Halifax. Most insurance companies, especially Norwich Union.

HelloThere wrote:

Please Help me with my home contents Insurance !!!

Ive been searching for the best deal on Home contents insurance and Halifax consistantly comes out cheaper and way below all the others.

Sound good yes? But i have 2 major concerns :

1. Is there sonething in the small print that makes it a bad deal and thats why its cheap, but I dont know what it can be ?? They come ou the cheapest on all the ways Martin has suggested.

2. They also dont even request what amount of contents cover they are covering !!! They say its 'unlimited' they say 'whatever needs replacing at the time' Whereas every other company I chat to, requests for an amount in a bracket eg. £40k, up to £70K etc..

It just sounds too good to be true donest it??? OR am i being to cynical??

Can anyone offer me any advice, Ive only got one week. !!

thank you.

Colin

bisto282

Thats because they give more discount to new customers rather than the customers they already have. I suggest getting a quote online first with any insurance company (even if you are already with them, a new business quote would be cheaper) then giving them a call making sure the information is correct, as the internet can be very misleading - This way you'll get the internet discount added in as well.

alanobrien wrote:

Further to my last post now i know sainsburys bank are having a laugh.

I just entered my renewal details into their website for a quote and it came to £347.15 which is £114 less than they want from me to renew. Madness.............

carled

Was with Direct Line for a year, B&C. This year's renewal went up by £100-ish (no claims either!) Hunted around and ended up with Egg, which comfortably beat any of the insuresupermarket or confused.com comparisions. Also getting £70 Virgin wine voucher!

Saved £110 off Direct line renewal quote and managed to include 24hr emergency home response option into the price as well.

colmil

My existing house contents insurance is now due for remewal at £121 (not mentioning their name for reasons that will soon become clear.)

I recently dropped my laptop but due to working away from home I have not had time to make a claim.

Having looked at other prices, it seems that I can save a good amount by changing insurers, but how would a new insurer react to a claim from me within a few weeks of taking out a new policy?

payless

some insurers won't even take on your business if there is an outstanding ( ie unsettled )claim- saying apply once existing insurer have paid up ( or rejected)

1 claim within last 12m would not normally exclude you from cover, but on a very rough average I would suggest you would look at 10- 35% higher premium due to that claim

cripcrones

My home insurance was with Alliance and Leicester, who transferred their business to Zurich. My renewal premium came through at £645. Using this site and insuresupermarket.com I found that Zurich was still the cheapest for me - the quote was initially £369. Once I had run the full quote on Zurich site (I added accidental damage and legal protection and disclosed a small claim I had last year) the qote had risen to £423 - still over £200 cheaper than my renewal premium! I phoned Zurich to let them know this - the ex-Alliance and Leicester business is run separately to the main business and they could not get my renewal quote down to the online quote. (I was told they use different underwriters)

Paying monthly instalments would have added an extra £40 roughly - at 9% interest (21% APR)

So, if your Zurich insurance is ex-Alliance and Leicester - you may be paying over the odds. We had no insurance tie-in with our motgage so we were free to swap over.