Reduced insurance premium – you’ve got to be joking!
What a strange world it is.
Today I ‘phoned to renew my car insurance. I told them some changes of details that I thought would reduce the premium. Not a bit of it, the premium increased.
Here’s the background. Up until June 2009 I was driving a 1600cc car that was 17 years old. I had made the mistake of falling in love with it, and couldn’t bear to part with it. Until then my comprehensive insurance had been under £300. That June I changed it for a perfectly normal hatchback car that was three years old, but had “sport” in its name, and was 2000cc. Of course, I had to pay a bit of extra premium to cover the time from June to my normal insurance renewal date in November.
At the beginning of September 2009, when I had only had the car for two months, I was driving along a winding, narrow country lane when a tall-sided lorry in front of me knocked a branch off a tree, which hit my car and dented the bonnet badly. I got the registration number and the name on the side of the lorry, but the insurance company could not get them to admit liability - I don’t suppose the driver even knew he had done it.
I have protected no claims discount so was not too worried. But come November and renewal time, the premium shot up to well over £500. When I asked why I was told bigger, more powerful and newer car - fair enough - and an own fault claim. You might well ask how I was supposed to stop a branch being knocked off a tree and hitting my car, but as far as the insurance industry is concerned it is an at fault claim. What a farce, my no claims discount is protected but the insurance premium still shoots up.
So what happens this November renewal? The premium quoted, which I am assured is the best available, goes up to £623, nearly £100 increase. Today I ‘phone them, and tell them that I am now completely retired so they can change my occupation, (was self-employed), and take off the “use by the policyholder in person for his or her business”. This, I am sure, will reduce the premium as there is no more business use.
NO, NO, NO - “we must recalculate as your details have changed”. And the result is the company I was with will no longer insure me because they only deal with people who are working!! And the lowest quote increased to £660, more than the ordinary renewal quote. Then the nice lady on the ‘phone says, “wait a minute, there’s no protected no claims discount with that. To get protected NCD it will cost you well over £700.”
Well, here’s a funny thing. When I bought my first car, which was a brand new, shiny Triumph convertible, it cost me £699. Now I am being asked to pay the same amount to insure my car for one year.
The nice lady worked hard on my behalf, and managed to find a discount, which I suspect is her discretionary allowance to cope with people who look as if they are going to cancel and go elsewhere, and got the premium with protected NCD down to £650. So I paid up. There is one small chink of light, the excesses levied on claims are less on this policy than they were on the previous one.
When I was little, it was explained to me that insurance works by lots of people paying a premium, and only a small number claiming in any one year. With a different lot of people claiming in the next year. And so claims were covered from other people’s premiums and the insurers still made a profit. That has now all gone out of the window. Insurance now means that we all pay vast sums towards the insurer’s profits, and, when we have to claim, we just have to pay an even larger premium the following year.
