Pissed off: Insurance daylight robbery

TH3R4POR said:
Yes, yes, I break the speed limit, but if I get caught I get caught, hands up and bend over (which I did when I got 3 points 6 years ago). I’m just playing devil’s advocate as I’d like to hear the logic here as to why you think you shouldn’t have to pay more than someone who has never broken the speed limit.
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I don't think having points makes you more likely to claim, or become a greater risk. It may simply be down to being in a part of the country with a stricter enforcement regime. If you do 40,000 miles a year and have 2 x SP60s then it could be said that you're safer/less risk than someone who's got one but only does 5,000 miles a year around town.

For example Liverpool used to only send out tickets based on the 10%+2mph rule - so you'd be let off for doing 35mph in a 30mph limit but would get a ticket for 36mph. Surely the driver who does 35mph is just as much a risk as the driver who did 36mph, yet they'd be treated differently for insurance purposes.

Liverpool now offer a 'speed awareness' course for anyone caught breaking the 30mph limit, but still within the 10%+2mph rule. However, if you refuse the £100 course you will get a ticket for 31mph-35mph where you never used to. If it was me, I'd take the course & pay the £100 as it'll cost you much more than that for the ticket and the increase in premiums over the next 5 years.

Luckily, the only time I've ever had speeding points was when the insurance company told me they'd take a note of them but they didn't load premiums for them, as 'everyone had a couple, and we're only interested in non-SP offence codes'.

I'd guess that for any insurance company that 'ignores' SP offence codes, they'll probably figured it into the premium anyway, but as it's not an additional premium there's nothing for them to discount or for you to challenge.
 
Heres one for you then, just been looking at possible renewal prices with elephant. It looks to be staying the same even if i remove my dad and put my 24 year old girlfriend on the policy who has 2 claims against her but is no longer a student but a teacher.

Now the bit i cant explain, if i say the car is kept in the garage its £950, driveway £860 and street £830?!!?! :headbang:
 
nobody mentioned price comparison websites
confused.com
comparethemarket.com
moneysupermarket.com

if you've never checked at least one of them then, yes, there is a good chance you are getting ripped off
 
mmm-five, the speed awareness programs and tickets for lower limits are changes in the local attitude of the police or laws, nothing to do with insurance companies.

I agree there are differences in circumstances surrounding tickets but again this would be an issue with the law wouldn't it? I mean it's the law that issues the fix punishment for the crime, unlike say murder where the punishment is handled on a case by case basis. If the law can't differentiate cases and just give a set fine and black and white guilty punishment on speeding then what can the insurance companies do?

un1eash said:
Now the bit i cant explain, if i say the car is kept in the garage its £950, driveway £860 and street £830?!!?! :headbang:
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As I said, there is no logic in the system...

House fire is literally the only reason I can think for that, and that would then be ignoring all 1001 greater dangers of theft or damage.
 
un1eash said:
Now the bit i cant explain, if i say the car is kept in the garage its £950, driveway £860 and street £830?!!?! :headbang:
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I noticed that on Admiral/Elephant too. I guess it may be due to car key burglaries - parking on the street would make it harder for some random person to guess which house to get the keys from...
 
un1eash said:
Now the bit i cant explain, if i say the car is kept in the garage its £950, driveway £860 and street £830?!!?! :headbang:
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Well in past month or so about 3 people on this forum have had their car vandalised and my guess is that they all park on the street or at best driveway.

EDIT: I just re-read your post! I don't get that!!! especially the garage one!!! :tumbleweed:
 
mindware said:
un1eash said:
Now the bit i cant explain, if i say the car is kept in the garage its £950, driveway £860 and street £830?!!?! :headbang:
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I noticed that on Admiral/Elephant too. I guess it may be due to car key burglaries - parking on the street would make it harder for some random person to guess which house to get the keys from...
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That would then ignore any other forms casual/accidental theft/vandalism. But assuming you're right that that is the case shouldn't garage still be cheaper than driveway?
 
As a general to comment on the thread I do understand people get pissed a the level of premiums and can always point to supposed inconsistencies. I'm on the other end of the scale and insure many cars for as little as £100 per annum fully comp (that's a 6 litre £10,000 value Jeep on a classic US car policy). I've had 1 accident in the last 20 years, garage my cars, am getting older and shop around :) I don't want to carry any loading for young people, higher risk , etc. My daughter pays her own £700 premium and imho is a great driver but a risk....She's been hit once already and ended up a knock for knock claim :thumbsdown:

I happen to have been in the credit card and lending business for decades and pioneered credit scoring models in many companies. Insurers use similar models to calculate risk. One of the least understood factors is correlation of risk factors.

You crash the premium goes up - easy to understand.
You get 3 points it goes up - harder to understand, but regardless of the oddities of speeding offences there is a higher propensity that a person caught speeding will result in a claim because on average they drive faster are less observant of cameras, aware of danger or something similar.
You're a single male aged 20 driving a high performance car - no score model needed - you're a risk (remember on average you will result in more claims)

So think like an insurer - reduce the risk and therefore premiums:
Don't get caught speeding
Reduce the agreed value of the car
Reduce the agreed mileage
Pay more excess because that means you believe in your own ability
Garage it or get it off the road, etc. so it doesn't get stolen
Shop around and don't let the clever algoriths take advantagfe of your laziness to shop around
 
TH3R4POR said:
mmm-five, the speed awareness programs and tickets for lower limits are changes in the local attitude of the police or laws, nothing to do with insurance companies.
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Yes, I know that. I was just pointing out that the risk element is not based on the same, universal criteria that it should be.

In Liverpool you can now get ticket for 31mph (if you refuse the course or have been on one in the last 3 years), whereas in Cheshire it might be 35mph before you get the ticket. If one driver gets a ticket for 80mph on a deserted motorway and the other for 40mph past a school (both 10mph over the limit) then, then in either case both drivers may be risk-assessed the same when they're clearly not*

* Yes, I know that speeding is an absolute offence and 0.1mph over the limit is enough to prosecute.
 
Admiral are odd sometimes. I''ve been with them (or Bell) 4 years, and each time it's ALWAYS cheaper to go on moneysupermarket.com and then phone them back with that price....the renewal is always artificially jacked. They start out saying 'sorry sir, nothing we can do' so you just have to tell them to cut the crap...you've had it priced matched every year. He then immediately flips and does it for you...

mmm-five said:
I don't think having points makes you more likely to claim, or become a greater risk. It may simply be down to being in a part of the country with a stricter enforcement regime. If you do 40,000 miles a year and have 2 x SP60s then it could be said that you're safer/less risk than someone who's got one but only does 5,000 miles a year around town.
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It's down to averages though. Every individual/car/location is infinitely unique in every way, so there is no real way to levy a premium based exactly on their characteristics - it would be impossible to implement. So insurers spend billions putting together and analysing statistics, the only thing they have on which to base their decisions. I guess they have evidence that, on average, they pay out 10% more often for people listed as 'graphic designers' rather than 'graphic illustrators', so they load the premium as such; they must also have stats showing speeding = more likely to claim...? Otherwise, in an open market, another insurer wouldn't, and they would get the business...

It's business after all- they are trying to make money by paying out less than they take in income. Maybe I'm lucky in that my dealings with insurers have been positive, but I just think for what we pay out, what we get back when things go wrong is a pretty good deal? E.G a friend with an M5 that was nicked....£56k cheque in two weeks, no attempts to deny claims, just excellent service and people trying to make things as smooth as possible for him. Premium went up 60% but he's just had back FIFTY SIX GRAND - more than he has probably spent in insurance his whole life...
 
Now take your own responsibility away completely. If a tree falls on your car, the damage is paid by the owner of the tree in whose garden it is.

Your premium STILL goes up as you are more likely now to have another accident, even though you were not even near the car at the time. So premium is also based on "bad luck" one way or the other. Bad luck of a cow walking on the motorway, bad luck of a tree falling over - but no reasonable explenation why your premium should go up?

Now add the following in the weird logic: drivers born abroad are receiving a loading as well, even if you are in the UK from the age of 1 month??? I assume they are trying to capture drivers from certain continents that are known as terrible drivers but even so ...
 
pvr said:
Now take your own responsibility away completely. If a tree falls on your car, the damage is paid by the owner of the tree in whose garden it is.

Your premium STILL goes up as you are more likely now to have another accident, even though you were not even near the car at the time.
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Technically your premium should go down, as there is now one less tree to fall on your car :lol:
 
Statistically I must park more under trees then in future as my risk has increased :)

Now for an interesting point - if you have a sex change, does your premium go down :D
 
pvr said:
. So premium is also based on "bad luck"
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Yup...if you are unlucky, you still may end up costing them more money than if you aren't :)

What was it Ricky Gervais said in the office?

'eliminate unlucky people from your recruitment drive by throwing half of the CVs on your desk in the bin.'

Quite a valid point really.....!
 
cj10jeeper said:
As a general to comment on the thread I do understand people get pissed a the level of premiums and can always point to supposed inconsistencies. I'm on the other end of the scale and insure many cars for as little as £100 per annum fully comp (that's a 6 litre £10,000 value Jeep on a classic US car policy). I've had 1 accident in the last 20 years, garage my cars, am getting older and shop around :) I don't want to carry any loading for young people, higher risk , etc. My daughter pays her own £700 premium and imho is a great driver but a risk....She's been hit once already and ended up a knock for knock claim :thumbsdown:

I happen to have been in the credit card and lending business for decades and pioneered credit scoring models in many companies. Insurers use similar models to calculate risk. One of the least understood factors is correlation of risk factors.

You crash the premium goes up - easy to understand.
You get 3 points it goes up - harder to understand, but regardless of the oddities of speeding offences there is a higher propensity that a person caught speeding will result in a claim because on average they drive faster are less observant of cameras, aware of danger or something similar.
You're a single male aged 20 driving a high performance car - no score model needed - you're a risk (remember on average you will result in more claims)

So think like an insurer - reduce the risk and therefore premiums:
Don't get caught speeding
Reduce the agreed value of the car
Reduce the agreed mileage
Pay more excess because that means you believe in your own ability
Garage it or get it off the road, etc. so it doesn't get stolen
Shop around and don't let the clever algoriths take advantagfe of your laziness to shop around
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Good input, thanks. On the excess piece, it was at total of 1200 for the first year. I do believe in my driving ability but given a scenario whereby the car was stolen or hit by an un-insured driver, I'd have to come up with a lot of money to get it sorted. Was looking to lower it but don't think that'll be possible.

I was looking on price comparison websites only 2 to give reasonable quotes are elephant and admiral (same company)? Bell isn't even listed on most comparison websites. So looks like I'm stuck admiral/elephant/bell group who have a strange canadian call centre (PM only) :thumbsdown:

Funny thing is - my other car insured with directline, 09 audi a4, on a 12 month policy with an excess of 400 pounds only cost 800 pounds. Ok The Z4 is a little faster but is worth at most half what the audi is. When you put the two next to each other, the A4 is almost twice the size of the Z so that would mean I could probably do a fair bit more damage with it... So I guess it could be something to do with it being diesel... Maybe statistically not too many boy racers go for a diesel :fuelfire:

So what am I supposed to do when I fancy something faster... like a Z4M or a TTRS... Wait till I'm 25?!
 
k3ab said:
So what am I supposed to do when I fancy something faster... like a Z4M or a TTRS... Wait till I'm 25?!
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That's what I had to do yeah. I struggled to get a quote at all from a lot of companies before I was 25 on my VR6.
 
k3ab said:
So what am I supposed to do when I fancy something faster... like a Z4M or a TTRS... Wait till I'm 25?!
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Well if you can afford it before your 25th then i'm sure you can afford the insurance. :P
 
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