Car insurance won't offer me a renewal quote
Discussion
I have just been told that my car insurance company will not be offering me a renewal quote and the policy will end on the original end date. The letter says if I was to continue covering my car I will have to use an other insurer.
If however I get a quote on a comparison site the.same insurer is happy to quote me and comes up as one of the top companies. I have full no claims and have not made any claims in many years.
Has anybody else had this happen or know what the reason for this could be?
If however I get a quote on a comparison site the.same insurer is happy to quote me and comes up as one of the top companies. I have full no claims and have not made any claims in many years.
Has anybody else had this happen or know what the reason for this could be?
Morning mate. Had similar with insurers before, I assume their financial people don't like the idea of anything that isn't a Quashqai or a Mokka or something. I've not been offered renewals on an Impreza and a T350C (also, hilariously, a Corsa, because that was my daily s
tbox).
Given your username I assume you have an E46 CSL, which some companies won't insure because it's too risky. When an OEM front bumper is over £4k + VAT, your average insurer won't be interested.
My litmus test when shopping around for insurance is if they actually know what the car is. When I was with my first insurer, the guy read off a script and asked me if my Vantage was a diesel, had 5 doors, and was it a hatchback or an SUV.
My current insurer, who I've been with for a few years and have consistently come in at about £20 over the cheapest alternative (i.e. it's not worth my time to fk about changing), asked two questions when I told them I had an Impreza. First question was "apart from the exhaust, any other mods?" - when I said you caught me off guard, wasn't expecting that, the guy said that if it wasn't modified, I'd be missing a trick, his second question was "any track days planned?"
Unfortunately in this day and age, everything's automated, to the point where you're drawn in by a low price and then get hit with the extra costs once you're in their system. My advice would be to find an insurance company that still uses telephones to speak to people.
tbox).Given your username I assume you have an E46 CSL, which some companies won't insure because it's too risky. When an OEM front bumper is over £4k + VAT, your average insurer won't be interested.
My litmus test when shopping around for insurance is if they actually know what the car is. When I was with my first insurer, the guy read off a script and asked me if my Vantage was a diesel, had 5 doors, and was it a hatchback or an SUV.
My current insurer, who I've been with for a few years and have consistently come in at about £20 over the cheapest alternative (i.e. it's not worth my time to f
k about changing), asked two questions when I told them I had an Impreza. First question was "apart from the exhaust, any other mods?" - when I said you caught me off guard, wasn't expecting that, the guy said that if it wasn't modified, I'd be missing a trick, his second question was "any track days planned?"Unfortunately in this day and age, everything's automated, to the point where you're drawn in by a low price and then get hit with the extra costs once you're in their system. My advice would be to find an insurance company that still uses telephones to speak to people.
Second Best said:
if they actually know what the car is. When I was with my first insurer, the guy read off a script and asked me if my Vantage was a diesel, had 5 doors, and was it a hatchback or an SUV.
Had similar with a supposed 'specialist' on an M3. Even though lass said she knew, she had to go through the same questions. Not a good sign when a business doesn't trust it's staff.
Moved to Manning UK several year ago. Consider a switch each year but they've remained competetive. I speak to the same guy each renewal and it's a very simple and sensible conversation.
CSLM3CSL said:
Yes it was the CSL. It doesn't surprise me they don't want to insure that sort of car but what did surprise me was they are willing to quote me via a comparison site.
Sometimes the quote on a comparison site will be a scheme/drive to drum up new business and we all know that in insurance, new business is king, so they will be willing to be flexible with cars that they would reject on renewals.For the last 3 years I've insured the family Bussat with Tesco Bank Insurance, but never renewed a policy. Each time it was substantially cheaper to use the quote on the comparison site than renew. Also if I renewed, I would lost the "free one year breakdown cover" that I get as a new customer.
Try Classicline. A CSL would be their sort of car. My LC500 is covered with them but I needed a tracker fitting - anything over 60k now needs one apparently. They have a telephone which they answer - a huge advantage. I've been with them for 20+ years I think, and I've never used their website, if they have one.
Sheepshanks said:
CSLM3CSL said:
If however I get a quote on a comparison site the.same insurer is happy to quote me and comes up as one of the top companies.
On the face of it, there's no logic in that. Is your "insurer" definitely an insurer themselves, or are they a broker? It's often hard to tell.
His current insurers (not a broker) weren't cheap so he did the usual online stuff.
The cheapest quote was from his current insurers & considerably less then they were asking for the renewal.
They clearly hadn't picked up that he was an existing customer.
He rang them and after a bit of umming & ahhing they agreed to renew at the online quote price.
Edited by paintman on Wednesday 29th March 10:58
paintman said:
The cheapest quote was from his current insurers & considerably less then they were asking for the renewal.
I've had that twice with LV=.Bit of digging and it turned out in both cases it was because the renewal was on an old policy that they no longer offered to new customers.
In the first case, there were quite big differences in the policy - the old one had no mileage stipulations, Euro cover was included and (most remarkable) it didn't require to be notified of speeding offences, unless they resulted in a ban.
The second time it happened was just over a year ago. The renewal leapt up. I complained and they said "do a new quote". Sure enough back to normal price. The new policy appears the same in all its main features. I assume it's some sort of 'scam' based on not being allowed to offer new customers a lower price than existing ones, so they keep changing the policies.
CSLM3CSL said:
I have just been told that my car insurance company will not be offering me a renewal quote and the policy will end on the original end date. The letter says if I was to continue covering my car I will have to use an other insurer.
If however I get a quote on a comparison site the.same insurer is happy to quote me and comes up as one of the top companies. I have full no claims and have not made any claims in many years.
Has anybody else had this happen or know what the reason for this could be?
I changed cars a year or so back and my then current insurer wouldn't cover me. Don't know why, age, I suspect. 'Computer says no'.If however I get a quote on a comparison site the.same insurer is happy to quote me and comes up as one of the top companies. I have full no claims and have not made any claims in many years.
Has anybody else had this happen or know what the reason for this could be?
I dived into the online comparison websites and sorted it, but it did take me aback, I will admit. I suppose the answer is to do the price comparison thing every year and pick the cheapest from the reputable companies.
Loyalty doesn't count for anything these days.
I had something similar, with BISL if I remember right. It was an employee benefit thing before anyone asks why I went with them!
Renewal came around, opened the letter and the number I saw was just over £5k. I was already paying just over £1000 a year fully comp, car was a Japanese import 300ZX.
I thought wow that's a bit steep, 500% increase in a year!??!?! Then I realised......it was £5k PER MONTH.
Obviously had to be a mistake so I called them up, lady on the phone laughed and said wow yes that sounds like a mistake let me check the quote for you......on hold for 10 mins, she comes back and is now speaking very quietly. Turns out the quote was correct.
What had happened was the company had been taken over/sold/acquired by another insurer that didn't cover grey imports. But rather than not renewing the policy, they sent this quote out.
Whats funny is I knew they'd been taken over because halfway through my policy I got a letter telling me my car would no longer be insured unless I supplied a list of modifications. Which I'd done when I took out the policy, Annoyed, I called them and asked why they were trying to reneg the policy halfway through and got a very short "we can do what we want, you're not covered" response. Apparently, my data hadn't carried over somehow in the acquisition. So I supplied them with the details again.
Few weeks later they'd come back to me and said they NEEDED a dyno print out to show how much power the car made with the modifications
I explained it had an intake and exhaust so probably nothing but they again threatened to cancel the policy. After a lot of arguing, I just told them a number and as it was less than 10% they went away. The worse company I've ever dealt with.
Renewal came around, opened the letter and the number I saw was just over £5k. I was already paying just over £1000 a year fully comp, car was a Japanese import 300ZX.
I thought wow that's a bit steep, 500% increase in a year!??!?! Then I realised......it was £5k PER MONTH.
Obviously had to be a mistake so I called them up, lady on the phone laughed and said wow yes that sounds like a mistake let me check the quote for you......on hold for 10 mins, she comes back and is now speaking very quietly. Turns out the quote was correct.
What had happened was the company had been taken over/sold/acquired by another insurer that didn't cover grey imports. But rather than not renewing the policy, they sent this quote out.
Whats funny is I knew they'd been taken over because halfway through my policy I got a letter telling me my car would no longer be insured unless I supplied a list of modifications. Which I'd done when I took out the policy, Annoyed, I called them and asked why they were trying to reneg the policy halfway through and got a very short "we can do what we want, you're not covered" response. Apparently, my data hadn't carried over somehow in the acquisition. So I supplied them with the details again.
Few weeks later they'd come back to me and said they NEEDED a dyno print out to show how much power the car made with the modifications
I explained it had an intake and exhaust so probably nothing but they again threatened to cancel the policy. After a lot of arguing, I just told them a number and as it was less than 10% they went away. The worse company I've ever dealt with. My other half just had exactly the same from Quote Me Happy. I totally understand their point though, how much would it cost if she were to prang her priceless speed machine? It's an '08 Astra 1.6 doing about 2500 miles per year. Through the price comparison sites, they were cheapest. Baffling.
Car insurance makes little to no sense at the best of times.
It's all data driven so human logic goes out the window.
Sometimes a slight variation on the same model is different
When you apply for car insurance affects it (earlier = cheaper)
Often comprehensive is cheaper
Sometimes lower voluntary excess is cheaper!
Even just your job title can make a big difference
Sometimes the cheaper insurer just isn't on the comparison site at that time/day
So lesson is, use comparison sites and try every possible permitation to find the best deal and try on different days and times
It's all data driven so human logic goes out the window.
Sometimes a slight variation on the same model is different
When you apply for car insurance affects it (earlier = cheaper)
Often comprehensive is cheaper
Sometimes lower voluntary excess is cheaper!
Even just your job title can make a big difference
Sometimes the cheaper insurer just isn't on the comparison site at that time/day
So lesson is, use comparison sites and try every possible permitation to find the best deal and try on different days and times
CSLM3CSL said:
Yes it was the CSL. It doesn't surprise me they don't want to insure that sort of car but what did surprise me was they are willing to quote me via a comparison site.
A quote on a comparison site means nothing, when you to try to take out the policy I suspect it will decline then or the policy will be cancelled soon after starting.Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff