Insurance - misleading pseudo-scams they use
Discussion
Hey guys
I was getting quotes for my cars this week, and I noticed something interesting. Although not directly a scam, I think some of the approaches are very misleading, to the point of being pseudo-scams.
At the moment my cars are all on an Admiral multicar policy, and I thought I would shop around. A few scammy observations:
- Multicar policies seem to be a con. We have three cars. An E46 M3, as a third car barely used with a 3000 mile or less limit, 5 years no claims, 35 years old in London, was £1.5k. I can get cheaper quotes directly on the car, so do not seem to benefit at all from having other cars with them? It seems multicar is just a word to capture more business that doesn't actually have any economic benefit.
- "Quoting for the rest of the year so it lines up with your other policy" is another slight con. I was quoted £500 for the M3, not bad. Oh, what, you mean just until the end of January. Can you tell me how much that is annually? "We don't quote annually". Do they thinks we don't have calculators?
- Adrian Flux I had high hopes for, but yet again, as every time I call them, and they're not the only ones... they asked me what the best quote I had got so far was, and offered £50-100 after running through the details. They ignore any online quotes because they "are not guaranteed"... yeah, but given they are 1/2 your price so I suspect even once executed it would be less
- The price comparison sites direct you to their partner/affiliate businesses rather than genuinely comparing the whole market. Again, not illegal, but just misleading
Am I on crazy pills?
I was getting quotes for my cars this week, and I noticed something interesting. Although not directly a scam, I think some of the approaches are very misleading, to the point of being pseudo-scams.
At the moment my cars are all on an Admiral multicar policy, and I thought I would shop around. A few scammy observations:
- Multicar policies seem to be a con. We have three cars. An E46 M3, as a third car barely used with a 3000 mile or less limit, 5 years no claims, 35 years old in London, was £1.5k. I can get cheaper quotes directly on the car, so do not seem to benefit at all from having other cars with them? It seems multicar is just a word to capture more business that doesn't actually have any economic benefit.
- "Quoting for the rest of the year so it lines up with your other policy" is another slight con. I was quoted £500 for the M3, not bad. Oh, what, you mean just until the end of January. Can you tell me how much that is annually? "We don't quote annually". Do they thinks we don't have calculators?
- Adrian Flux I had high hopes for, but yet again, as every time I call them, and they're not the only ones... they asked me what the best quote I had got so far was, and offered £50-100 after running through the details. They ignore any online quotes because they "are not guaranteed"... yeah, but given they are 1/2 your price so I suspect even once executed it would be less
- The price comparison sites direct you to their partner/affiliate businesses rather than genuinely comparing the whole market. Again, not illegal, but just misleading
Am I on crazy pills?
I agree that they can do this, I would just expect better, and look forward to big Insurance companies getting crushed by fintech and innovation.
They have incredible big data at their fingertips to drive the best outcome for the customer that also works for them, but continue to exploit it to maximise profit.
As an example, I told Admiral that all three cars are barely driven - none more than another. My no claims is used against a Prius. Applying it to the M3 instead brings the total premiums down by £500. The risk to them is the same, they just go from superprofit on my accounts to regular profit.
Why should they do that?
If they told me this without my having to ask I'd be happy and a loyal customer. As I had to find out myself, I am looking to leave.
They have incredible big data at their fingertips to drive the best outcome for the customer that also works for them, but continue to exploit it to maximise profit.
As an example, I told Admiral that all three cars are barely driven - none more than another. My no claims is used against a Prius. Applying it to the M3 instead brings the total premiums down by £500. The risk to them is the same, they just go from superprofit on my accounts to regular profit.
Why should they do that?
If they told me this without my having to ask I'd be happy and a loyal customer. As I had to find out myself, I am looking to leave.
So... eventually ended up getting so fed up of all this I just went through every permutation with Admiral and sticking with them.
I can get it slightly cheaper elsewhere, but for the sake of a few £100 I thought better the devil you know.
Key thing here was that *if I ran an insurance company* I would suggest/offer the best possible permutation, without the customer having to figure it out. I'd still make a good margin, but I would have super loyal customers who knew I wouldn't try and hoodwink them come renewal or additional car on the policy time.
£1500 for a 35 year old with 5 years no claims in London on an E46 M3 worth £8k.
Ouch!
No wonder there are so many uninsured drivers!
TwigtheWonderkid said:
The problems come when customers, trying to get the best price, add on drivers who won't actually drive (nothing wrong with that) in order to reduce the premium,
I actually realised this when I added my mum to the old Ferrari 348 as a joke and she bough the premium down by £12. BOOM! IN YOUR FACE BIGCO INSURANCE FAT CATS!Also, we should bash insurance companies to much, they make up a huge % of most of our pensions...!
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