Direct Line Having A Laugh...

They aren't supposed to do it, but they still do it. Then moan it costs them X amount a year when people hop insurers every renewal.

Like everything you MUST buy, it's a con.
 
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Iamzod said:
You seem overly angry over the cost of a decent takeaway for two, the person you spoke to can't change their underwriting criteria.

Bank Of Scotland isn't the Parent Company of Direct Line either and as far as i'm aware have never been involved, RBS used to hold 400+ million shares but sold them 9 years ago.
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It is a good story for the pub crowd tho.
 
It is the nature of insurance books and what is important to a specific insurer at a specific time. I know there are people on here who work in insurance who can speak about it far better than me, but both my cars have gone up by circa £250-£300 a year each, which is down to the 2 insurers I am with showing they are more risk adverse or less interested in retention of my business. Comparisons show lots of savings to be had so that is what I will do/did.
 
Lol got my renewal quote from them this morning and they wanted £273. which has gone up from £212 last year. Phoned them up and basically told them they were taking the pee. After some back and forth the new quote for this year is £204. I call that a result on my part. I could have got it a little cheaper else were but could not be bothered with all the hassle.
 
Currently got my M850i insured with them for £457, due to renew next month. They only increased my premium by abut £120 when I switched the policy over to it. Cheapest anywhere else is about a grand so really assuming I'm going to get stung pretty badly :(
 
Direct line were among the most expensive for me when shopping around last summer. Ended up going with Darwin for half the price, which ironically is the same group!
 
I think car insurance in general needs a massive overhaul, I had an accident in November it was 100% not my fault and my second non fault accident in the past 5 years, I have been playing with quotes and even with my extra year no claims(I know they don’t have much effect after 5 years) my quotes have gone up a minimum of £120. I really think if your involved in a non fault accident you should be able to claim that years price rise from the other side’s insurance, as long as nothing has changed with the car or person
 
It's about risk. Having non-fault accidents can be deemed to be an indicator of increased risk. Claiming the price rise from the "other side's" insurance wouldn't help overall, that would just put premiums up for everyone so they can cover this additional cost. I think it would be quite hard to legislate also, I mean say your insurer said "OK we're putting your premium up by £5k". You are like "I don't care, I'm not paying it, someone else is". But the third party insurer isn't going to be happy stumping up an extra 5 grand on top of the claim cost they already covered last year. They will challenge that figure. It would make Reserving really hard because you'd have to have additional liquidity to pay for future third party policies you have little knowledge of.

It would basically be a dodgy scenario where an insurer could effectively have a blank cheque to get money off another insurer. Something like that would never happen in insurance, it would be a bit like, I don't know, say giving someone a really overpriced hire car, and telling the other side to pay for it.... :)
 
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HangTime said:
It's about risk. Having non-fault accidents can be deemed to be an indicator of increased risk. Claiming the price rise from the "other side's" insurance wouldn't help overall, that would just put premiums up for everyone so they can cover this additional cost. I think it would be quite hard to legislate also, I mean say your insurer said "OK we're putting your premium up by £5k". You are like "I don't care, I'm not paying it, someone else is". But the third party insurer isn't going to be happy stumping up an extra 5 grand on top of the claim cost they already covered last year. They will challenge that figure. It would make Reserving really hard because you'd have to have additional liquidity to pay for future third party policies you have little knowledge of.

It would basically be a dodgy scenario where an insurer could effectively have a blank cheque to get money off another insurer. Something like that would never happen in insurance, it would be a bit like, I don't know, say giving someone a really overpriced hire car, and telling the other side to pay for it.... :)
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Come on mate like with the majority of things in life you would have to get 3 quotes, and the insurance company would only play the difference from the cheapest quote. It’s also an easy get out from an insurance company to say your at increased risk because someone crashed into you, it’s just a ******** way of insurance companies increasing money for shareholders
 
Who controls the quotes though, I mean it just seems highly unpredictable what random 3 quotes a person is going to get and hence the insurer doesn't know how much they need to reserve for it. Because motor insurance has such high ratios (i.e. very low profit margins) it would inevitably lead to rising premiums on average.

The risk element is quite logical, it could be for example that there is something in your driving style that results in more accidents regardless of whether you are technically at fault. It 'feels wrong' to people because they are somehow emotionally involved, they take it personally and feel unfairly treated if they have to pay more because of something they were not deemed responsible for.
 
EvilRob said:
Currently got my M850i insured with them for £457, due to renew next month. They only increased my premium by abut £120 when I switched the policy over to it. Cheapest anywhere else is about a grand so really assuming I'm going to get stung pretty badly :(
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Got my renewal, £650 - not bad at all! Not sure whether I should just accept it quietly or try and push them to get it down closer to last years.
 
EvilRob said:
Got my renewal, £650 - not bad at all! Not sure whether I should just accept it quietly or try and push them to get it down closer to last years.
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I always ring the insurer and say something along the lines of " i've had my renewal and I want to pay less" and they normally find a few quid they can knock off, even if its only £50, its worth a 20/30minute phonecall in my eyes.
 
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