cannot quite understand car insurance..

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..have moved from a terraced street with a postcode that covers some of the ropey parts of Leicester to a semi with a drive in a classed as 'better' postcode and our insurers say the price is the same...!!

am I missing something?
 
I think that you have to assume that these guys will milk you for every penny you can. You have to shop around, have you tried one of those comparison sites? I always use them now and have managed to save on insurance for two cars and on house insurance too.
 
Unless you move to the middle of nowhere from the middle of a city the postcode won't make that much difference to your insurance. Also you have to remember the ropey areas are where they live, they pinch the cars from the better areas!
 
gazfy said:
Unless you move to the middle of nowhere from the middle of a city the postcode won't make that much difference to your insurance. Also you have to remember the ropey areas are where they live, they pinch the cars from the better areas!
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Haha brilliant!
 
gazfy said:
Unless you move to the middle of nowhere from the middle of a city the postcode won't make that much difference to your insurance. Also you have to remember the ropey areas are where they live, they pinch the cars from the better areas!
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LOL good point; I thought 'busy narrow road terraced area with 126 houses on it to quiet area 44 houses with driveways, surely it will be a little bit cheaper'...

wonder if I had gone somewhere where it should be higher would it have stayed the same??
 
I moved from. High risk to a low risk area many years ago. When I informed my insurance company they told me that it would be 20% cheaper....


Woooohooooo


Then they said that as I was 6 months into my policy I'd not get a refund.....


And we want £20 for updating you details !!!!!!!
 
When i got a quote for my insurance i changed my sex to female and it was 200 euro cheaper. Might be time to get a sex change.
 
Get back on to the phone to them. They like to try it on, and they'll always give you the biggest price first.
 
When renewing my car insurance last month I forgot to tick the protected no-claims box, after getting the quote I noticed this and corrected my mistake, premium recalculated and b****r me it went...................................................................................down a tenner.:clap: This I did not expect although I did save £200 by going direct to the insurer rather than accepting my brokers renewal for the same company.
 
we renewed in march (no one could beat renewal quote) and paid a large deposit, have paid approx £350 so far of a £513 policy, we are now changing to a classic car and its not financially viable to stay with the current insurer, so guess how much of that £350 we get back when we cancel the policy.................................................£80! So we will have paid £270 for less than 3 months insurance!!!
 
you pay most of your car insurance anyway to cover those who cant be bothered to buy it themselves!
 
I've been looking to swap my 11 year old Nissan 200 SX (2 litre petrol turbo, 197 BHP, 147mph four seater coupe, insurance group 18) for something with lower running costs - fuel, tax, insurance, servicing, tyres etc. - and have just been getting quotes for a nearly new Fiesta 1.6 TDCI Econetic (95 BHP, insurance group 4).

I'm 48 years old and have a blemish free claims history. I can get my current car insured with MoreThan for £232 fully comp and protected. They want £344 to cover the little diesel Fiesta. The best price on the Fiesta with another insurer is still over £300. What's the story there I wonder? It makes no sense to me. How can a group 4 car cost 50% more to insure than group 18?

By the time I've factored in depreciation against lower fuel charges and offset road tax savings with increased insurance premiums I can't see that I'll be any better off.
 
I work for aviva (hence my renewed interest in photography) and the underwriting factor's in policy are baffling. I work in motor claims and liability, so if you have an questions feel free to ask!

Tdodd - I'll be to do with the fact its a newer vehicle, it's more attractive to nick!
 
tdodd said:
I've been looking to swap my 11 year old Nissan 200 SX (2 litre petrol turbo, 197 BHP, 147mph four seater coupe, insurance group 18) for something with lower running costs - fuel, tax, insurance, servicing, tyres etc. - and have just been getting quotes for a nearly new Fiesta 1.6 TDCI Econetic (95 BHP, insurance group 4).
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1.6TDCi seem to attract higher premiums :/ I think its because their quite popular with some of the more accidental stereotypes.

It also has a Turbo which doesn't help
 
tdodd said:
I've been looking to swap my 11 year old Nissan 200 SX (2 litre petrol turbo, 197 BHP, 147mph four seater coupe, insurance group 18) for something with lower running costs - fuel, tax, insurance, servicing, tyres etc. - and have just been getting quotes for a nearly new Fiesta 1.6 TDCI Econetic (95 BHP, insurance group 4).

I'm 48 years old and have a blemish free claims history. I can get my current car insured with MoreThan for £232 fully comp and protected. They want £344 to cover the little diesel Fiesta. The best price on the Fiesta with another insurer is still over £300. What's the story there I wonder? It makes no sense to me. How can a group 4 car cost 50% more to insure than group 18?

By the time I've factored in depreciation against lower fuel charges and offset road tax savings with increased insurance premiums I can't see that I'll be any better off.
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I don't work in insurance, but I can guess. Given your age and history the "damage you do to 3rd parties" part of the premium is going to be relatively low, but the repair / theft replacement cost of your own car part of the premium will be higher as the car is new and therefore likely to be higher value.

If you had bought an 11 year old diesel Fiesta rather than a new one you might have seen your premium go down.
 
Rustynick said:
Tdodd - I'll be to do with the fact its a newer vehicle, it's more attractive to nick!
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I can understand the logic there.

unplugged said:
1.6TDCi seem to attract higher premiums :/ I think its because their quite popular with some of the more accidental stereotypes.

It also has a Turbo which doesn't help
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My current car has a bigger turbo, twice the horsepower, adds 30% to the top speed and trims over 4 seconds off the 0-60. Spare parts for repairs might well be more difficult to find, and quite possibly not as cheap as for current production models.

Regardless of the buying demographic, it's me asking for the insurance quote, not the rest of the planet. I'm not going to become a worse driver overnight by swapping form a 200 BHP RWD coupe to a wheezy little five door hatch with 95 BHP at best. I've been driving for 30 years and have no claims against me.

If the car is such a giant insurance risk, why is it only group 4 and not group 14 at least? There is something here which to my mind really does not stack up.

Anyway, not trying to be argumentative, but really shocked that insurance on my current motor is so much cheaper than for the Fiesta. I thought the Fiesta should cost far less than my car, not considerably more.
 
onomatopoeia said:
I don't work in insurance, but I can guess. Given your age and history the "damage you do to 3rd parties" part of the premium is going to be relatively low, but the repair / theft replacement cost of your own car part of the premium will be higher as the car is new and therefore likely to be higher value.

If you had bought an 11 year old diesel Fiesta rather than a new one you might have seen your premium go down.
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That seems logical. Mind you, when comparing quotes I even entered a vehicle value of £4,000 for both cars, just to even the odds as much as I possibly could.

I'll try a quote for some old banger and see how that turns out. :)

p.s. I got hold of a genuine number plate for a car of interest and once I entered the plate, rather than a generic vehicle selection, the best price dropped to £280.

EDIT : I put in some old Fiesta 1.4 diesel wheezer from 2001-2005 vintage, 2002 registration, and the best premium was still over £300. This is nuts.
 
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Fair Point :/ I went from a 1.3 petrol to a 1.6 TDCI and despite 9 yrs protected no claims a lot of insurance companies wanted over double what I was currently paying.

Insurance costs have increased a lot recently anyway due to the way their no longer allowed to discriminate between sex and the apparent increase of non insured drivers on the road (kind of a chicken and egg situation) I don't know of anyone this year that hasn't seen an increase in their premiums.
 
Yes, but on a new quote they still only want £232 for my beastie. That's actually dropped down from my renewal in Feb of £258, which at the time I could not beat. As per my previous post, even for a crapped out Fiesta of similar vintage (not a new one) they actually want more, much more. :thinking:
 
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tdodd said:
EDIT : I put in some old Fiesta 1.4 diesel wheezer from 2001-2005 vintage, 2002 registration, and the best premium was still over £300. This is nuts.
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Well I only pay £360 to insure my Boxster S and that's group 20 (fully comp, full NCB, no claims or convictions etc). Not sure what's going on with your premiums.
 
onomatopoeia said:
Well I only pay £360 to insure my Boxster S and that's group 20 (fully comp, full NCB, no claims or convictions etc). Not sure what's going on with your premiums.
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That makes two of us. The quotes are coming back from confused.com from a very broad range of insurers. All the quotation details - drivers, miles per annum, occupations, usage, even vehicle values are the same apart from the vehicles themselves.

Here's my recent quote history, showing the renewal I paid in Feb for my Nissan of £258 at the bottom and the latest quote for that car of £232 at the top, with the Fiestas all being much dearer....

20110505_162555_.JPG


Fiesta 1.4 diesel from 2002 (best quote)....

20110505_161844_.JPG


Nearly new Fiesta 1.6 TDCI (best quote once I supplied an actual registration number)....

20110505_162142_.JPG
 
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Well this makes a Friday brighter, I only pay £278 for 09 S2000, group 20. surely the value of the Fiesta as a write off must be greater than your Nissan hence an increase, or you need to check directly with insurers to save money
Oh I believe £40 of every premium goes to an uninsured drivers fund.
 
well our new car is home :)
We'll be changing the insurance over in the next couple of days, then the old one will be going up for sale.
Going from a 2001 90bhp pug 406 HDI estate to a 1985 1.1 mk3 escort 3 door, premium going from £513 to £197 :D very happy with that! although still a bit annoyed at how little we get back for cancelling current policy!
MPG increasing too, OH drove the escort back from stoke to llanelli (approx 190 miles) and it used just 1/4 of a tank, approx £15!! Of course thats assuming the fuel gauge isnt lying! hehe
 
I recently changed from an 11year old Fabia to a brand new Ibiza - both comparable engine size and horse power etc - one worth about £250 and one worth about £12500

Difference in premium = £16 more for the year (£8 for the remaining 6 months)

£25 admin fee to change it
 
I was recently getting quotes to insure my Peugeot 206 as it is renewal time. I notified my current insurers that I was recently made redundant so that for the time being my yearly mileage would be reduced as I wouldn't be commuting hoping this would reduce the premium. They gave me my quote and it had doubled to £1100.:eek:

The reason they gave for the increase was the fact that as I am currently unemployed it is seen as an increased of claiming.

After trying comparison sites, the premiums double on all insurers if you put down that you are unemployed.
 
I'm unemployed and have been for the last nine years. I have no idea why anyone should think that unemployed people should be a higher risk. They typically don't drive to work and certainly don't try to do so in peak traffic hours.
 
tdodd said:
I'm unemployed and have been for the last nine years. I have no idea why anyone should think that unemployed people should be a higher risk. They typically don't drive to work and certainly don't try to do so in peak traffic hours.
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Hmm ... apologise if the following appears controversial and offends. It is from the point of view of my previous employer, whom I worked for for 10 years or so, and proclaim to be Britain's largest insurer.......and is in no way my point of view.

The general take is unemployed = low income = more likely to need to claim for a small loss and / or more likely to inflate a claim in order to benefit from a claim . Not saying for one iota this is you , or anyone else on here, however the trends and stats do back up the theory, so once again those who take the pee make it worse for others......

Likewise in recent years, and dare I say with the expansion of the EU, insurance claims and prices have been inflated (yes, if you want I could if I were allowed to, provide you with shedloads of data on Eastern Europeans doing "slam-ons" (5 in a car, brake hard, get hit up the bum and then claim whiplash......)

Buy a £500 quid car..... do it - 5 x £3k (average) = £15k or so a time, rinse and repeat.......

For that we all pay.
 
It doesn't offend, and I'm sure you're right, but my entirely claim free record should indicate that I am not a high risk to insurers.

I'm unemployed because I chose to give up work before I hit 40. Apparently I'm not allowed to describe myself as "retired" although as far as I am concerned that is exactly what I am. I have never claimed a penny from the state and still pay my taxes on investment income, which is how I fund my life. In fact I over pay and get a refund each year. I have no mortgage and no debt, other than a small credit card balance which is paid in full every month.

We may all have to pay for the "crooks" in society, but there is no reason to put my personal premium up simply because of my employment status. They gather enough flipping personal information when you ask for a quote. Perhaps they should actually use it to calculate premiums.
 
tdodd said:
It doesn't offend, and I'm sure you're right, but my entirely claim free record should indicate that I am not a high risk to insurers.

I'm unemployed because I chose to give up work before I hit 40. Apparently I'm not allowed to describe myself as "retired" although as far as I am concerned that is exactly what I am. I have never claimed a penny from the state and still pay my taxes on investment income, which is how I fund my life. In fact I over pay and get a refund each year. I have no mortgage and no debt, other than a small credit card balance which is paid in full every month.

We may all have to pay for the "crooks" in society, but there is no reason to put my personal premium up simply because of my employment status. They gather enough flipping personal information when you ask for a quote. Perhaps they should actually use it to calculate premiums.
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Wow. Wish I was in your boat! :)

Unfortunately though, and I have argued the toss with underwriters and actuaries from here to kingdom come, on this, but it is my belief that Loadings and discounts are applied inappropriately.

For instance, "Do you pay annually or monthly for your insurance?"

The latter will load a lend rate of approx 10% APR, and also from underwriting experience, monthly payers arer a worse risk, hence another 16-20% on the premium.

My argument is some higher risks, eg <25, or living in a postcode with a single letter at the start, generate such a premium that paying by month is the only way affordable...........

Ergo, the situation derives how you pay for your insurance and the risk is proportioned to that, not how you choose to pay for ins.
 
Lynton said:
Wow. Wish I was in your boat! :)
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It's not a very luxurious boat. Modest living is the only way to make it work for me. I used to be very materialistic and capitalist in my views, ambitious and always wanting more. I was also stressed and becoming increasingly miserable with the longer working hours and unwelcome travel and nights away from home.

Now I have a relaxed life that allows me to be quite calm and at peace with the world. No deadlines. No drama. I may not be rich in monetary terms, but I've got my girlfriend, my dog and my cameras and reasonable health. In terms of contentment I'm pretty much up there. What more does a man need?

Oh yes, cheap car insurance.
 
tdodd said:
It's not a very luxurious boat. Modest living is the only way to make it work for me. I used to be very materialistic and capitalist in my views, ambitious and always wanting more. I was also stressed and becoming increasingly miserable with the longer working hours and unwelcome travel and nights away from home.

Now I have a relaxed life that allows me to be quite calm and at peace with the world. No deadlines. No drama. I may not be rich in monetary terms, but I've got my girlfriend, my dog and my cameras and reasonable health. In terms of contentment I'm pretty much up there. What more does a man need?

Oh yes, cheap car insurance.
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How much would your insurance be if you stated you were a photographer. Nothing to say you have to be paid for your work and how could they prove differently.
 
Car insurance

Quick tip for keeping insurance premiums down. Change insurance companies each year, I have found that insurance companies tend to do the first years cover cheaper as a "come on" hoping you will stay with them forever.
I have just changed from Direct Line been with for some years (£409 quote) to Sainsburys (£298 quote) for exactly the same cover this year.

Realspeed
 
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nilagin said:
How much would your insurance be if you stated you were a photographer. Nothing to say you have to be paid for your work and how could they prove differently.
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Id guess that photographer is quite 'high' risk as they will think that photographer = speeding down roads to get a picture and therefore higher risk of accidents.
 
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