Car Insurance Auto Renew

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  • tempus_fugit
    tempus_fugit Posts: 1,189 Forumite
    First Anniversary First Post Name Dropper Photogenic
    daveyjp wrote: »
    If autorenewal is a pain imagine what it was like 30 years ago.

    Get renewal then spend the next few weeks calling brokers or insurance companies to get quotes. It used to take hours answering the same questions over and over again to half a dozen or so companies.

    My insurance expires soon. Reminder sent four weeks ago, less than last year. Comparison site details were stored from last year so they emailed me updated quotes, nothing cheaper.

    I now do nothing more. Autorenewal kicks in and I am continually insured.

    All I had to do was read two emails.
    Thirty years ago generally you would go through a broker, ie one broker, and they got the quotes for you, so you didn't have to answer the same questions over and over again. I know this because I worked in the sector 30 years ago. It was certainly much different from now.
    Retired at age 56 after having "light bulb moment" due to reading MSE and its forums. Have been converted to the "budget to zero" concept and use YNAB for all monthly budgeting and long term goals.
  • rosierd
    rosierd Posts: 22 Forumite
    Combo Breaker First Post First Anniversary
    johnsmith1890 wrote: »
    Just to clarify one point about auto-renewal: it's NOT done for your benefit, it's done for the benefit of the insurance company.


    I'm not saying the technique is good, bad or indifferent (I currently have it in place for motor insurance), but don't think the company is doing it out of the goodness of their hearts to stop you being uninsured; they aren't. They don't care whether you're insured or not. They use auto-renewal as inertia selling to boost sales. That's all there is to it.

    Makes sense until the customer calls up and says they have gone elsewhere so that 'Sale' comes straight back off again. The benefit to Insurance companies is people allowing it to auto-renew and not shopping around so the company earns money on an inflated renewal. However all companies now have to quote last years premium and advise people to shop around as they could get it cheaper hence making it more difficult to benefit from that extra income.

    But the benefit to the customer is if the price is reasonable you needn't do anything. No shopping around online or on the phone entering details and what about if you had forgot to deal with it and luckily it did auto-renew that really is for your benefit!
    I work in Insurance (Broker). All views are my own.
  • Kernel_Sanders
    Kernel_Sanders Posts: 3,617 Forumite
    First Anniversary First Post Combo Breaker
    penners324 wrote: »
    All car insurance companies will email you with the new quote about 28 days prior.
    So how much time does that leave you to decide not to renew (without being charged)?
  • Marvel1
    Marvel1 Posts: 7,171 Forumite
    Name Dropper First Post First Anniversary
    Kernel_Sanders wrote: »
    So how much time does that leave you to decide not to renew (without being charged)?

    Plenty, my current one expires 30th June, found a new one 2 weeks ago and phoned current one straight away, sorted.
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