Renewal
Posted: Sun 17 August, 2014 Filed under: Bankruptcy, Domestic, Driving, Finances, Getting Organised 4 Comments »This month is renewal month for my car insurance. Always iniquitous, this time they’re really taking the piss.
After two years with the same company, with no claims, and no need to contact them at all, they’ve *raised* my premium – and not by a small amount. For no good reason that I can see, they’re trying to charge me no less than £30 *a month* more.
Amusingly (if you find sheer profiteering cuntishness to be amusing) they’ve also quoted me via an insurance comparison website at *half* what I’m currently paying.
Needless to say, I’ll be moving. And I’m really looking forward to the call where I tell the current set of shitbags why I won’t be renewing with them.
Is it because your bankruptcy shows up when they credit check you?
Nope – by law they can’t use bankruptcy etc. to affect car insurance.
Most other types can be affected – i.e. the industry can refuse to cover you because you’ve been bankrupt – but because car insurance is a must-have, they can’t use it as a factor.
Basically, the company in question are just shysters of the highest order. I did call them up to contest it (there having also been a quote from them on CTM that wasn’t much cheaper than my current one) and they dropped it to that without even querying.
Because I’m interested in such things – I can’t find any exact legislation about car insurance and bankrupts, but there are plenty of sites stating that not all companies will provide cover in these circumstances.
From what you say – while there could be something saying that your current insurer legally can’t decline you further cover (in the same way that the insurer you have when you are flooded now can’t decline you further cover), I doubt any legislation could stop them raising the premium.
They can use any factors they like to determine the price they want you to pay (claiming it as ‘business decision’), and all insureres now credit check you when they quote, irrespective of whether you want to pay in instalments.
I’ve just had eactly the same battle with Mr BW’s renewal insurance – they wanted a huge amount more, and when I challenged them, they said it was because I (a named driver) had claimed for a new windscreen 15 months ago (a claim with a totally different company, that I hadn’t declared/notified because I didn’t know you had to) that they could see on their insurance-wide connected database. Like you, I got the premium back to below what it was the previous year, just by playing the ‘dim wife’ card (as opposed to the ‘bolshy’ card: it’s a new variant I’m trying because I get bored with the other!)
Yeah, could be. I declared it – knowing how they like to decline a claim for any damn thing – when I moved to them just post-bankruptcy, and was told it wasn’t a factor because of aforementioned legality. They were on a par with other insurers on comparison site [x], and that didn’t change when I told them, so *shrug*.
It’s also not something you have to mention in their applications (or those for other car insurance) etc., so I further assume it’s not a factor.
As for the credit-checking, that’s fine with me. It establishes that record of checks, which I’m doing gradually and slowly, building up the track-record. I think (but don’t quote me) that the credit-check is part of the whole new FCA’s ‘responsible credit’ and ‘affordability’ checks, which are utter piss, and plug a hole that wasn’t an issue in the first place. But that’s a rant for another day.