Car insurance quote.

[opstrat]

Got a quote from Marshmallow on the 9th of august. i have an email with the amount and it says it is valid for 30 days. insurance is up on the 31st so went to purchase the policy today and its went up when i followed the link in the email. the price is roughly £75 more

went through the web chat to see what happend and i have thie following conversation.

Spoiler

12:12 PM | [email protected]: i have a quote valid for 30 days. i have just gone to purchase the policy and the price has gone up

12:12 PM | Operator: Connecting you to an agent...
Current response time: Less than 5 minutes

12:13 PM | Katie from Marshmallow: Hi there, you're through to Katie

Thanks for getting in touch

12:13 PM | Katie from Marshmallow: So it's likely that the reason your price has gone-up is the time you went to go and purchase your quote with us.

We, along with many other UK car insurers, use 'real-time' pricing. This means that the quote price will constantly change depending on our pricing factors and when you proceed to purchase the policy.

When you (either) entered the final questions on our website or proceeded to purchase on a different day your price was recalculated based on today's date and our current pricing and your quote subsequently changed.

I do appreciate that this must be incredibly frustrating for you, but unfortunately, that is how our pricing system works. I'm very sorry!

It is something that GoCompare and Money SuperMarket warn about on their websites, though. I've attached screenshots of what it says on their websites below.

[Image "Screenshot+2020-05-06+at+10.51.14.png"] [Image "MSM+Quote+Change.png"]

12:14 PM | [email protected]: but my email says it is valid for 30 days

12:16 PM | Katie from Marshmallow: A quote is not necessarily a fixed price, is what I'm trying to explain. Sorry if that's disappointing

12:17 PM | Katie from Marshmallow: A quote being valid for 30 days means the details you've entered will be saved for 30 days

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Exported from Marshmallow on August 28, 2021 at 12:21 PM Europe/London time BST (GMT+0100)

is it me thats being stupid here or them?

 

[Semple]

I would say that definitely sounds stupidity on their part.

To me.. a "quote is valid for X days", versus "a quote is saved for X days" means two different things. The latter is seemingly what they claim, saving your details so that you can re-run the quote. If it's "valid" - probably a key word here, then you'd expect that to be a fixed price for that duration.

Might be one to complain to the ombudsman and trading standards for misleading words.

 

[Gilbert89]

If they won’t honour that I would go with someone else out of principle.

 

[andicole0]

If they won’t honour that I would go with someone else out of principle.

This, or go somewhere else anyway. Try the comparison marketplace, then Directline to see if they'll do better. Don't forget policies differ, cheaper ones may not be as good.

 

[BUDFORCE]

Go elsewhere.

In fact, wait 13 days, cancel the insurance, then go elsewhere.

.........

 

[jpaul]

was it a quote off of a comparison site (versus a direct quote) , maybe a similar deal
-> https://nz.trustpilot.com/review/ww...AzNjE4ODAwMHw2MGNjZDM1Y2Y5ZjQ4NzAzYjBmMjYwM2M

Reply from Marshmallow

Hi Nigel

I can see that we did, in fact, honour your original quote price.
As already confirmed in our email on 16th June, we have refunded you the difference. Please note that refunds can take between 5 - 10 days to reach your account, depending on your bank's processing times.

I understand the wording on the comparison site incorrectly stated that our price would be fixed for 30 days, when actually we use 'real-time pricing.' I can only apologise for the error, thank you very much for bringing it to our attention - we have now corrected this on the comparison sites.

I'm pleased to see you persevered & continued on to buy a policy with us. We're very happy to have you on board.

Best wishes
The Marshmallow Team

 

[Haze]

Cool story bro, shame this is the only insurance company in the country, and there is nothing you can do about it....

 

[DanTheMan]

Yeah sounds like rubbish to me.

I know quotes tend to get more expensive the closer to the day of purchase you get but anywhere reputable that I've used will save a quote for 30 days and it won't increase regardless of when you start it.

In fact, I started a policy with LV last week that I got the quote for the month before and then just set it to start on the day my previous insurance expired.

 

[Haggisman]

In the 20 odd years I've been driving, this is the first time I've heard of this being a thing. Valid for 30 days means valid for 30 days...

Mental note to avoid Marshmallow

 

[theone8181]

I thought QUOTE was legal jargon anyway and it was binding (unlike an estimate).

 

[~Divine~Wind~]

Marshmallow?

Obligatory... Who?

I can probably list 20 maybe 25 insurance co's from my price comparisons and the likes and I've never once heard of Marshmallow.

As others haev said there are many other insurance Co's available, give them your money

Also depending on the car you may find that joining an owners club may get you a members discount at certain insurers

 

[Kautya]

I would just find another insurer.

 

[jpaul]

RAC INSURANCE !

in other insurance news, has anyone investigated what this message is, accompanying their online quotes

Your total insurance price includes an Intermediary Services Fee of £40.00 payable under your separate contract with BISL Limited

I know they are a broker, like the AA, but does that indicate you should be able to go direct and avoid £40,
the premium it's associated with is ~£200pa

 

[Gaygle]

What Marshmallow clearly do feels like a dishonest practice and should be sent to the FCA. They say they use "real time" pricing, ok, well then how long is the quote valid for? Will it change in the 5 minutes between them giving me the quote and me paying for it? Or do I have 24 hours to pay for it? They need to state how long that quote will be valid for, and not try and blag it with some "real time" bull.

That's why proper insurance companies give you a quote that is valid for 30days.

Marshmallow know what they're doing and it's there to catch people out who just expect to go through and pay for their premium without checking if it was the same as what they were quoted.

 

[Hades]

As above I would report this to the FCA.

They sound like a terrible company to deal with if you ever actually had to claim.

 

[tom_e]

As others have said, report them for false statements and use someone else.

 

[jpaul]

RAC INSURANCE !

in other insurance news, has anyone investigated what this message is, accompanying their online quotes

worth knowing -

RAC & Admiral it seems don't refund complete premium if you cancel before the policy starts, but direct line and churchill do !

I usually renew next years premium a few weeks beforehand, but would cancel that, if I then find something better.

 

[HangTime]

RAC INSURANCE !

in other insurance news, has anyone investigated what this message is, accompanying their online quotes



I know they are a broker, like the AA, but does that indicate you should be able to go direct and avoid £40,
the premium it's associated with is ~£200pa

You might not save £40 going direct though, they might have discounted pricing via the broker. Some insurance products are not even made available direct to consumers.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Its probably a service fee paid from the main insurance company to part of its operations that is dealing with the admin side, and hence its not an addon, but has to be listed to be legal.
I was with one of the largest UK insurers years ago and we did this due to VAT.
Insurance is not a VATable product but a lot of the inputs are and the VAT is hard to reclaim.

Setting up a service company made this much easier (to balance input and output VAT)

 

[Name]

Added marshmallow to the list, thanks.