European Cover - is it worth the paper its printed on?
Discussion
I am planning a trip to Europe in August and was looking for cheap European cover in case of any breakdowns, which touch wood wont be required.
However, my car is 16 years old so doesnt fall into most 15 year or younger policies, so the price seems to rise.
More worryingly is reading a lot of small print and from a mates experiences last year is that if they believe the recovery cost to be more than the car is worth market value, then they will leave it there and not recover back to the UK.
The current market value of my car is probably less than a grand, but there is no way i would leave it behind and accept a payout, as its not like i can just buy another.
The main reason for having European cover would be to get my car home, yet this looks like it might not happen, so is it worth getting in the first place?
Any one got any thoughts on this or direct me at useful companies who could help? Cheers
However, my car is 16 years old so doesnt fall into most 15 year or younger policies, so the price seems to rise.
More worryingly is reading a lot of small print and from a mates experiences last year is that if they believe the recovery cost to be more than the car is worth market value, then they will leave it there and not recover back to the UK.
The current market value of my car is probably less than a grand, but there is no way i would leave it behind and accept a payout, as its not like i can just buy another.
The main reason for having European cover would be to get my car home, yet this looks like it might not happen, so is it worth getting in the first place?
Any one got any thoughts on this or direct me at useful companies who could help? Cheers
Just paid £90 to the AA for 10 days cover of a 17 year old Merc. Fortunately in this case we had no bother.
Four years ago the same AA 5 star cover collected us from the hardshoulder on a spanish motorway near Bilboa, took us to collect a hire car which we kept for 3 weeks and dropped off in Le Havre, brought some the dead Austin Healey (dropped no 1 big end). English speaking phone line is nice too.
Very good value.
Four years ago the same AA 5 star cover collected us from the hardshoulder on a spanish motorway near Bilboa, took us to collect a hire car which we kept for 3 weeks and dropped off in Le Havre, brought some the dead Austin Healey (dropped no 1 big end). English speaking phone line is nice too.
Very good value.
legturbo said:
mines only going to be a four day excursion, so hopefully i can find it cheaper than £90 but i'm impressed with the service you received, and assume your merc wasnt worth a great deal?
The Merc we just took is a '93 SL, its insured for £6k.Its not a 500 quid C cleass!
Will be much less than £90 for 4 days. I wont go to the continent without the AA cover.
check this thread out mate
http://pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f... European breakdown cover - info
http://pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f... European breakdown cover - info
Someone in the uni motorclub crashed there 17yo mr2 turbo on the ring as got it back to the uk FOC with the cover they took out from ADAC.
It was very cheap really, £75 i think for full european cover.
Initially there was a little bit of an issue regarding it being 17yo and probably a write off but bit of phoning around and a conversation to the garage at Adenau in broken english got them to understand that the car was not standard and although probably written off we still wanted to bring it back to the uk to re-shell it.
The cars due to return to the uk in a fortnight on the back of a eightcar transporter with a load of others. He flew home.
Daniel
It was very cheap really, £75 i think for full european cover.
Initially there was a little bit of an issue regarding it being 17yo and probably a write off but bit of phoning around and a conversation to the garage at Adenau in broken english got them to understand that the car was not standard and although probably written off we still wanted to bring it back to the uk to re-shell it.
The cars due to return to the uk in a fortnight on the back of a eightcar transporter with a load of others. He flew home.
Daniel
thanks for the help so far 
im interested to find that the ADAC still brought the Mr2 home even though it was probably classed as uneconomical recovery, though maybe the fact that it is being sent on a transporter with a load of others helped?
Its not a 500 quid C cleass!
Will be much less than £90 for 4 days. I wont go to the continent without the AA cover.at 6k that would be above the threshold for economical recovery i would think, but as my car is insured for around £1200-£1500 but by the books is worth around £850 it would very quickly not be 'worth' bringing it back from a companies point of view, as outlined in the AA's small print too 
the four day quote cam e back at £68.50 which if ADAC is £75 for a year then its a no brainer.. but im still just not sure if its worth it.
Any major problems i would wonder whether it would work out easier to get a friend to rent a trailer and come over to collect my car if needs be, i'm only going as far as the ring..
im interested to find that the ADAC still brought the Mr2 home even though it was probably classed as uneconomical recovery, though maybe the fact that it is being sent on a transporter with a load of others helped?
Huntsman said:
legturbo said:
mines only going to be a four day excursion, so hopefully i can find it cheaper than £90 but i'm impressed with the service you received, and assume your merc wasnt worth a great deal?
The Merc we just took is a '93 SL, its insured for £6k.Its not a 500 quid C cleass!
Will be much less than £90 for 4 days. I wont go to the continent without the AA cover.
the four day quote cam e back at £68.50 which if ADAC is £75 for a year then its a no brainer.. but im still just not sure if its worth it.
Any major problems i would wonder whether it would work out easier to get a friend to rent a trailer and come over to collect my car if needs be, i'm only going as far as the ring..
legturbo said:
im interested to find that the ADAC still brought the Mr2 home even though it was probably classed as uneconomical recovery, though maybe the fact that it is being sent on a transporter with a load of others helped?
Maybe.- I dont know how much the garage in Adenau work with ADAC and the ring, clearly the garage do a lot of the ring recovers including the mr2 with there trucks. But clearly i would say adac end up quids in if they dont recovered it compared to the if they, and if the garage gets the car, so might they! But from our point of view it was just a case of repeatedly and badly trying to explan we didnt want it writen off and we wanted it home! Eventually the man at the garage sort of seemed to say 'ah well, whatever' and then said if we rang adac (£1 a min sitting in call queues) he would talk to them. He then did. all sorted.
Daniel
Had a similar issue trying to cover my MX5 (for a trip over stelvio 
)
Found out that Quotelinedirect (http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/redir/3072c5f2) has a deal with Europ Assistance for a £59 annual UK and Europe policy covering any individual vehicle that's less than 20 years old for a year. Includes UK home-start, and onward travel for passengers, plus up to 90 days a year cover in Europe. However bear in mind you won't be covered within Europe for the first ten days of the policy, so you'll need to start up 10 days before you go.
Useful if your UK breakdown cover is almost up, then you don't have to worry about paying huge excesses when you take the car away.
Considering I got quoted over 90 quid from the AA for two weeks recovery cover I took this out instead!
Hope this helps, and good luck!
)Found out that Quotelinedirect (http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/redir/3072c5f2) has a deal with Europ Assistance for a £59 annual UK and Europe policy covering any individual vehicle that's less than 20 years old for a year. Includes UK home-start, and onward travel for passengers, plus up to 90 days a year cover in Europe. However bear in mind you won't be covered within Europe for the first ten days of the policy, so you'll need to start up 10 days before you go.
Useful if your UK breakdown cover is almost up, then you don't have to worry about paying huge excesses when you take the car away.
Considering I got quoted over 90 quid from the AA for two weeks recovery cover I took this out instead!
Hope this helps, and good luck!
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