Admiral "Plug and Drive" promotion.

[Semple]

So Admiral seem to be running this exclusive promotion "Plug and Drive", where essentially you plug-in a telematics box for 3 months, then send it back for an assessment on your driving.

Now they claim that 80% of their customers that have used the promotion have received a discount. But what they fail to mention is how much the discount is.


Has anyone on here been on this promo and what sort of discount did you receive?

I'm still in two minds about whether to signup for it. On one hand anything that can lower a premium is a good thing, but on the other hand, if the discount is fairly measly say 5% which for me works out to be £30, then that's a lot of faff for such a small discount.

 

[Jamesyboyjim]

So you have to drive like you're on your test for 3 months?! What if the box determines you've broken the speed limit a few times? its easy to creep over a bit. Would your premium then rise the following year?

They aren't doing it because they want to save you money!

 

[Nasher]

Whenever I have seen quotes for these on comparison sites they have always been ridiculously expensive. Way more than just going through a broker for regular insurance. I cant see there being much of a "discount" in the end.

 

[swain90]

Does it mention anywhere that there are charges for changing information on your policy?

If there are and it is a 5% discount I can imagine seeing that £30 you just saved being used to pay their "admin charges".

 

[Liquidfox]

Would your premium then rise the following year?

They aren't doing it because they want to save you money!

If it does you simply jump ship to another insurer. They might not be doing it to save you money, but if it reduces their risk it saves both parties money which is only a good thing.

 

[Semple]

So you have to drive like you're on your test for 3 months?! What if the box determines you've broken the speed limit a few times? its easy to creep over a bit. Would your premium then rise the following year?

They aren't doing it because they want to save you money!

From what i've read some insurance companies actually dish out fines, even if they've not been captured in an "official capacity" - i.e. police etc.

Although the box would use GPS, so i know on my car a little over 75 works out to be around 70mph when measured by GPS. So creeping over a bit shouldn't be that hard to control.

Just read a post over on MSE, and someone there has a premium slightly less than mine, and after achieving "Silver" status, only got £26 discount, which worked out to be around 4.5%.

 

[Nasher]

The GPS isn't super accurate though, also if you have a weak signal it can be way off! So I hope they don't rely on it to much.

 

[Semple]

Does it mention anywhere that there are charges for changing information on your policy?

If there are and it is a 5% discount I can imagine seeing that £30 you just saved being used to pay their "admin charges".

You mean in terms of updating the policy to mention telematics installed?

When i skimmed through the T&C's, i didn't see a mention of any charges - only if the unit doesn't get returned, or returned damaged.

There's not a lot of info around really as it's swamped with the telematics policies for first time drivers where they're normally installed for the entire year. And the way theirs works is by refunding part of your policy every so often if your driving standard is good.

As i'm not a first time driver, this is a slightly different scheme, as i'm 6 months into a 10 month policy, they assess 3 months and then determine what sort of discount you can get on your renewal - on top of your NCB i'd assume.

 

[ajf]

I guess for new drivers these might be good, but unless they become compulsory I won't have one.
They only show a very narrow band of driving ability.
For example, you might be sticking to 70mph on a motorway, but it won't show it was thick fog with no visibility.
Conversely the nice 'safe' driver doing 40mph in a 60mph, but with a long queue behind them, when the road is dry and clear etc.
90mph on a clear motorway in good visibility though would be seen as dangerous.

It doesn't take into account the drivers awareness to their surroundings, which is arguably more important than the overall speed.

 

[Arazi]

So you have to drive like you're on your test for 3 months?! What if the box determines you've broken the speed limit a few times? its easy to creep over a bit. Would your premium then rise the following year?

They aren't doing it because they want to save you money!

Bingo.

 

[Cleisthenes]

FYI

Facebook forces Admiral to pull plan to price car insurance based on posts

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2016/nov/02/facebook-admiral-car-insurance-privacy-data

 

[Joe T]

So you have to drive like you're on your test for 3 months?! What if the box determines you've broken the speed limit a few times? its easy to creep over a bit. Would your premium then rise the following year?

They aren't doing it because they want to save you money!

You will save money as a customer because the premiums will drop due to a discount because of the lower associated risk. Everybody wins.

 

[New World Order]

I had one with Bell which is part of the same group. When removing the black box out of the 12v to vacuum, it broke apart inside the 12v socket causing the 12v to fail. Bell didn't give a toss.

I didn't accelerate any slower then normal and didn't exceed 80 indicated on the motorway, maintained a gold rating.

 

[Freakbro]

Heh, Watchdog just mentioned on next weeks show is 'how accurate are the black boxes provided by car insurance firms'

 

[Marvin]

You will save money as a customer because the premiums will drop due to a discount because of the lower associated risk. Everybody wins.

Yeah, I really don't understand this "insurance is a scam" mentality. I do work in the industry so perhaps I'm biased, but anything you can do to prove that you present a lower risk will mean your premium decreases as well. All insurers aim to have a flat loss ratio across their whole book of business, otherwise one group subsidises another group. Therefore the premiums charged are a best estimate of trying to ensure all sub-groups/classes of drivers (however that might be cut) pay an amount which represents the risk they bring into the book.

AXA did a little info thing about profit in private car insurance:

 

[Nasher]

Businesses do not invest money in things that will make them less money. This is for them to be able to find more excuses to pump up premiums and squeeze out more profit. If you think it will save your money, your being conned.

 

[Marvin]

Businesses do not invest money in things that will make them less money. This is for them to be able to find more excuses to pump up premiums and squeeze out more profit. If you think it will save your money, your being conned.

Of course not, but the idea is to reduce claim costs, allowing them to win more business by having cheaper premiums. If you fit their risk profile, you win, if you don't, they'll be more expensive. There is a highly competitive market out there, it's not OPEC, they can't just charge what they want.

 

[Nasher]

They could reduce claim costs by not shelling out so easily for silly stuff like whiplash. Which doesn't even happen on modern cars due to seat design.

 

[Marvin]

The costs are determined by the courts. Not much an insurance company can do against a judge's decision.