European breakdown cover
Discussion
I'm thinking of taking out some cover as I'll be in France for 2 weeks in June in a 16 year old car. I don't have any breakdown cover in the UK anyway so was looking at a single trip cover, best I've found so far is £76 for a fortnights cover - seems a bit much to me, what's everyone paying?
Naughty Magpie said:
I thought AA covered you for European countries if you had a UK policy/cover. Is this not so then? I have a car that is 50% likely to break down so I need to check this it seems! 
Well I guess it depends on the level of cover, the cover I have with them seems to have everything apart from European Cover....but then I haven't taken it out directly with the AA.
I will be getting some cover as I don't fancy getting stuck out there if anything goes wrong....
Shop around, especially if your car is over ten years old. AA/RAC/Green flag tend to be a bit pricey, last year I covered my 12 year old Elan for about £40 through Britannia Rescue. Subsequently found Esure were about the cheapest at around £20 for the weekend but I can't see it on their site this year. Check the small print to ensure it includes a replacement car if they can't repair your vehicle as some policies only cover repatriation of the vehicle.
If you have fully comprehensive insurance you might also want to check that the fully comp part covers Europe as some only offer third party when you're abroad.
If you have fully comprehensive insurance you might also want to check that the fully comp part covers Europe as some only offer third party when you're abroad.
mellow_yellow said:
If you have fully comprehensive insurance you might also want to check that the fully comp part covers Europe as some only offer third party when you're abroad.
Under EU and UK law all insurers must give you the minimum covered required in the country that you are travelling - usually third party only (not even fire and theft). If you want to increase your policy to your normal level of cover you need to request Green Card cover (note many insurers don't now actually issue a pysical Green Card anymore) this will increase your cover to the same level you have the rest of the time. Some insurers charge, some don't.
Even if you're with an insurer that says you get a number of days Green Card cover for free you still have to tell them the dates that you're going, the countries you're travelling to and (usually) whether you are towing anything.
Naughty Magpie said:
I thought AA covered you for European countries if you had a UK policy/cover. Is this not so then? I have a car that is 50% likely to break down so I need to check this it seems!
As an AA member I've used them for previous Le Mans trips for Euro Cover. It's not included in UK 'standard AA cover' unless you pay quite a bit extra for an upgrade service, (I think a lot more than the £30+ quid I normally pay for 5 day Euro cover)
(Also suppliments are payable on cars over 11 years old)
I changed my ACO membership to take the option of swapping to the formula securi 1 (same price) so that I can utilise the breakdown service, but i dont get the result sheet and the piccie sent to me... no brainer really especially as I am finalising the purchase of a house in france.. still get all the other perks.. and a few more 
I have Jaguars that I keep in France on UK plates plus an annual green card from my insurer. This, for the every day car costs £700 per annum for a Mercedes. They don't charge extra for the annual green card either. For the classic cars, all over 40 years old, I have RAC cover which isn't cheap but if you are a member of a car club most have such options available through one of the big two. They do short term options too quite cheaply. One option if your car is quite ancient.
lowdrag said:
I have Jaguars that I keep in France on UK plates plus an annual green card from my insurer. This, for the every day car costs £700 per annum for a Mercedes. They don't charge extra for the annual green card either. For the classic cars, all over 40 years old, I have RAC cover which isn't cheap but if you are a member of a car club most have such options available through one of the big two. They do short term options too quite cheaply. One option if your car is quite ancient.
Sorry, but if your cars and you live in France they MUST be French registered. Please do not run any of us over in one of them, as your insurance is invalid.
cooperlola said:
lowdrag said:
I have Jaguars that I keep in France on UK plates plus an annual green card from my insurer. This, for the every day car costs £700 per annum for a Mercedes. They don't charge extra for the annual green card either. For the classic cars, all over 40 years old, I have RAC cover which isn't cheap but if you are a member of a car club most have such options available through one of the big two. They do short term options too quite cheaply. One option if your car is quite ancient.
Sorry, but if your cars and you live in France they MUST be French registered. Please do not run any of us over in one of them, as your insurance is invalid. www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/684121/ShowPost.aspx
fagey said:
I changed my ACO membership to take the option of swapping to the formula securi 1 (same price) so that I can utilise the breakdown service, but i dont get the result sheet and the piccie sent to me... no brainer really especially as I am finalising the purchase of a house in france.. still get all the other perks.. and a few more
I have been an ACO member for about 4 years now, and chose ACO over Club 24 to get the breakdown cover, I pay an extra €30 (I think) to get all the results sheets, programme etc. which you get as a Club 24 member. Only thing with the ACO breakdown cover is that securi 1 only gives you one breakdown call out per year, and I don't know if it would cover to get your car back to the UK.
Something to note when buying euro cover is that repariation cost are often limited to market value so if you are running something a little older/less valuable they may not bring it back for you. Like this one
www.directline.com/european_motoring/coverDetails.htm
www.directline.com/european_motoring/coverDetails.htm
Sorry Cooperlola but - my fault - you got the story wrong a bit. I have a house in the UK and one here. I just prefer to live here and have friends look after the house in the UK, that's all. Yes, I live here but I discussed this with both my insurers and they are quite happy on all counts. The only problem is MOT's but thanks to the change in the law that will all alter next year anyway.
It's worth making sure you have "proper" phone numbers for breakdown cover and medical insurers rather than just 0800/0845 numbers.
When reggie the rodent ate through the turbo waste pipe on the Saab at Spa a couple of years ago we ended up having to ring someone in the UK for them to ring the breakdown cover provider to get a normal telephone number as the 0800/0845 numbers don't work out of the UK (unless things have changed now).
When reggie the rodent ate through the turbo waste pipe on the Saab at Spa a couple of years ago we ended up having to ring someone in the UK for them to ring the breakdown cover provider to get a normal telephone number as the 0800/0845 numbers don't work out of the UK (unless things have changed now).
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