Just what part of the word "austerity" don't insurance brokers/companies understand? I've just received an annual renewal quote from my home contents insurance broker. It's a mere snip at £518.37, a slight increase of 95% from £265.80 last year. A few months ago my buildings insurance was quoted at £670.34, up 4.6% from £640.96 which is practically a cut by comparison. Nevertheless, I could have been paying £1188.71 for insurance this year.
But I didn't, of course. I used the well known website of Saint Martin Lewis to find better quotes and, having previously got my BI for £202.66, I now have my CI for £71.24, total £273.90, a saving of £914.81 or 77%.
Okay, I have cut down the value of the contents cover and upped the voluntary excess, so the comparison is not strictly valid, but stopping the inexorable index-linking of sums insured seemed a good idea. How many of us would really replace, new for old, every single item in their homes in the event of fire or flood? Would I replace every book, every item of clothing, every piece of furniture, every gadget, every kitchen appliance or even the antique and expensive hi-fi, now rarely used? I think not.
I've always hated insurance companies. Protected in law by uberrimae fidei "with utmost faith", they are almost impossible to challenge and can use almost any policyholder mistake to avoid paying out. Likewise, their savings vehicles have usually been obscure and poor value (endowment policies, anyone?).
Long ago, I decided to get even. I bought shares in Prudential and have collected several insurance companies since. I've done quite well, so far. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em. But beating them and joining them is even better.
My car insurance quote has about doubled, too. Broker tells me Birmingham 1 - 30 has been rerated because basically the insurers don't want the business.
ReplyDelete:-D Was wondering about the radio silence. Welcome back. Nice summary of the Insurance industry. I don't like them very much either. Directline would send me a quote each year that was nearly 1.5 times more than last years' premium. I would visit their website, get a reeeeally cheap quote for the same spec and confront them over phone with the screenshot. Embarrased silence, muffled whispers and 45 seconds later, my "new" quote would go through.... Thieving mongrels!
ReplyDeleteOh, and BTW, never told you in the past, nice name for the blog (I was explaining to DW about the Latin phrase, and remembered I've never told you).
Well done on squeezing them till the pips squeak. There's also the catch that if an insurance company loss assessor deems you underinsured, they will scale down the settlement pro rata. And it's them who gets to say you are underinsured...
ReplyDeleteI also like to get both from the same company, which gets round the problem of the buldings people pushing some things onto contents and vice versa, slugging it out for ages.