Car Insurance Prices Falling.....?

[Tonberry]

I run my details through price comparision sites every 3 months or so to see what I'm able to insure.

After having a quick look today, prices on average have dropped £400 across the board with my details having stayed the same.

Anyone else experienced this?

N.B. 23 - 2yrs NCB - Driving 4 years

[Negative Creep]

I just got fully comp with drive any vehicle for £330 (and a free cuddly Meerkat as well)

[ZOLLAR]

Some people will see reductions however most premiums have increased.

[Shaw Tarse]

Negative Creep said:

I just got fully comp with drive any vehicle for £330 (and a free cuddly Meerkat as well)

Cuddly meerkat http://www.ebay.co.uk:80/itm/180700301374

[Pints]

Shaw Tarse said:

Cuddly meerkat http://www.ebay.co.uk:80/itm/180700301374

Why on earth are those things selling for so much?

[p4cks]

Pints said:

Why on earth are those things selling for so much?

You could get your insurance through there, then sell the toy which means that a good chunk of your insurance has been paid for. Interesting.

[TomJS]

Shaw Tarse said:

Negative Creep said:

I just got fully comp with drive any vehicle for £330 (and a free cuddly Meerkat as well)

Cuddly meerkat http://www.ebay.co.uk:80/itm/180700301374

Was the £330 before or after you sold the dodgy meerkat?

[Maximum bobs]

Shaw Tarse said:

Cuddly meerkat http://www.ebay.co.uk:80/itm/180700301374

If the meerkats did classic car insurance I could sell the toy & be able to insure my Land-rover not only for this year but for the next two as well.

Edited, Actually my maths is crap. Not quite the next two years unless the ebay price rises a bit more.

Edited by Maximum bobs on Saturday 30th July 14:20

[driverrob]

Tonberry said:

N.B. 23 - 2yrs NCB - Driving 4 years

There's the reason your premiums might be falling. Your stats are improving noticeably all the time. Once you've passed 25 and got max. NCD years it'll be a different story.

Except my wife's premiums have fallen the last 2 years!

[PumpkinSteve]

Mine has dropped but, as mentioned above, I have more NCB and I'm older so it's what I would expect. I did have the usual stupid quotes for £3000+, silly considering my renewal was £480.

[martin84]

Mines come down considerably but over 25 with a good NCB, no points etc its to be expected, for the under 21s and those in bad postcodes its still rising so high you might as well not bother with it.

[ZOLLAR]

martin84 said:

Mines come down considerably but over 25 with a good NCB, no points etc its to be expected, for the under 21s and those in bad postcodes its still rising so high you might as well not bother with it.

Not bother with insurance?, if they do that fully expext your premiums to rise then.

[martin84]

No what im saying is if insurance is simply too expensive, unobtainable and the penalties for driving without it somewhat less punishing than the cost of doing things legally then nobody can be shocked or surprised when people dont bother with it. I dont think uninsured drivers put my premiums up to the extent the Government claim, they say it adds £30 to the cost of honest drivers premium, well what about the other £500 that plenty of motorists have seen added to their bill despite not having done anything wrong? Referal fees and the insurance companies being owned by banks desperate to get money from somewhere i feel are more serious contributers to the recent rises than uninsured drivers.

[ZOLLAR]

martin84 said:

No what im saying is if insurance is simply too expensive, unobtainable and the penalties for driving without it somewhat less punishing than the cost of doing things legally then nobody can be shocked or surprised when people dont bother with it.

What you need to bear in mind is that if you are prosecuted for no insurance you can be liable to pay for the third party costs i.e. £100,000s +

martin84 said:

I dont think uninsured drivers put my premiums up to the extent the Government claim, they say it adds £30 to the cost of honest drivers premium

It's not the government that claim this it's the insurers, the cost of uninsured drivers is carefully monitored by insurers

martin84 said:

, well what about the other £500 that plenty of motorists have seen added to their bill despite not having done anything wrong? Referal fees and the insurance companies being owned by banks desperate to get money from somewhere i feel are more serious contributers to the recent rises than uninsured drivers.

If you can't afford to insure you do not drive it's simple, you can't blame the banks, insurers etc for your lack of moral compass (not you the uninsured drivers I mean).

[martin84]

Im not blaming the banks for people driving without insurance, im just taking issue with the claim that its uninsured driving which is increasing premiums at a fast rate. As you've just corrected me that its the insurance industry which makes the £30 claim that even backs up my point even further. Referal fees and skint banks are the biggest contributors but obviously you wont get the insurance firms to admit that will you? Their own system is inflating the prices just as much as what any illegal drivers are. Lets face it theres been people driving without insurance and ambulance chasers for many many years yet the most alarming rise in premiums seems to have occured since the financial crisis in the last handful of years.

Im not condoning people driving without insurance, or encouraging it, or making excuses. Im just saying with prices like that one cannot be shocked or surprised that it happens. I completely agree with you that if you cant afford it dont do it. No need to preach to the converted.

[ZeeTacoe]

driverrob said:

Tonberry said:

N.B. 23 - 2yrs NCB - Driving 4 years

There's the reason your premiums might be falling. Your stats are improving noticeably all the time. Once you've passed 25 and got max. NCD years it'll be a different story.

Except my wife's premiums have fallen the last 2 years!

Haha

Mine has gone up from £650 to £660 despite having another year of ncb and driving an IG5 car. It's a fking joke how much my insurance cost and how high some of the quotes have been.

[martin84]

I think more of it is due to postcode rather than our ages, experience etc than we realise. I just went on a comparison site and did nothing but move my location from where i am now to a Manchester postcode and it went from my £297 to £1,456.

[ZOLLAR]

martin84 said:

Im not blaming the banks for people driving without insurance, im just taking issue with the claim that its uninsured driving which is increasing premiums at a fast rate. As you've just corrected me that its the insurance industry which makes the £30 claim that even backs up my point even further. Referal fees and skint banks are the biggest contributors but obviously you wont get the insurance firms to admit that will you? Their own system is inflating the prices just as much as what any illegal drivers are. Lets face it theres been people driving without insurance and ambulance chasers for many many years yet the most alarming rise in premiums seems to have occured since the financial crisis in the last handful of years.
.

Plenty of people within the industry have admitted that this is a main cause of increases nobody denies that, but insurers don't force people to make spurious and hyperbolic claims, ultimately it's down to peoples integrity if they stopped claiming for injuries that are non existant then no doubt premiums would fall.
What about insurers that aren't owned by banks?, they're increasing the premiums due to increased injury costs and the whole "no win no fee" saga among other things, you're right in saying that ambulance chasers have been around for years but insurers have been forcibly trying to keep premiums low but there comes a point when that money needs to be recovered and last year we started that journey.
I'm not saying uninsured drivers are the sole reason for the increase but they do contribute a hefty amount to premiums.

[martin84]

But the insurance companies automatically sending you through claims management companies and collecting their lovely referal fees (which goes round like a vicious circle achieving nothing but inflating prices) merely encourages false whiplash claims, if anything it feels like insurance companies are telling you to claim for it. And they tell us to never admit fault no matter how obvious it is we were wrong and are happy to make the other firm pay £1million in legal bills to prove you were wrong which again has to be recouped from somewhere. The system is just as to blame as the people who play it and use it to their own advantage.

Unfortunatley thats not going to change, you wont make the public all decide 'oh lets be honest now' its not going to happen. Ive read stories about countries which run this on sort of a 'price list' basis and a certain injury receives a certain fixed payout, end of discussion, no arguments. May sound a bit too one-size fits all but it does stop all the legal boffins attacking the system from all sides purely to inflate compensation fees. I forget which country it was now i'll have to hunt for the article.

[ZOLLAR]

martin84 said:

But the insurance companies automatically sending you through claims management companies and collecting their lovely referal fees (which goes round like a vicious circle achieving nothing but inflating prices) merely encourages false whiplash claims, if anything it feels like insurance companies are telling you to claim for it. And they tell us to never admit fault no matter how obvious it is we were wrong and are happy to make the other firm pay £1million in legal bills to prove you were wrong which again has to be recouped from somewhere. The system is just as to blame as the people who play it and use it to their own advantage.

True some insurers send you too an accident management company but if they don't AMC get the info elsewhere so the insurer may aswell do it at least that way the money is reinvested into premiums rather than outside the industry, but as I said they don't force you to go ahead with the claim.

martin84 said:

Unfortunatley thats not going to change, you wont make the public all decide 'oh lets be honest now' its not going to happen. Ive read stories about countries which run this on sort of a 'price list' basis and a certain injury receives a certain fixed payout, end of discussion, no arguments. May sound a bit too one-size fits all but it does stop all the legal boffins attacking the system from all sides purely to inflate compensation fees. I forget which country it was now i'll have to hunt for the article.

If done correctly I would support that sort of change, it's probably only for low end injuries such as whiplash etc but that sort of regulation may help reduce costs.