Car insurance in the UK with Irish licence/driving history/no claims discount

StudentC

Hi

I'm looking for suggestions for companies to get motor insurance quotes from in the UK.

I moved over here a couple of years ago and haven't had a car since, starting to think about it now. However, the facts that I haven't lived here very long and that I have no driving history here (I do at home, with 5+ years no claims) appear to be weighing against me with the insurance companies and giving me high quotes. At home I was paying around €400 per year, here I am getting quotes of minimum £900, with most around £1,500. I know insurance is a bit higher here anyway, and the car is slightly different, but those are horrible prices!

Anybody any suggestions of good companies or brokers to try? I searched on here and in a previous thread about importing cars people mentioned Adrian Flux and AJ Insurance for taking Irish history into account - I've rung both of them and got £1600 and the £900 respectively.

Thanks for any sugegstions

Technoprisoner

my brother is insured with direct line and they accepted his irish no claims discount....if you do get insured with them do yourself a favor and take a photocopy of your no claims discount as they have a tendency to loose the no claims.

r3nu4l

What are you driving?

Have you tried the comparison sites?

When I first started driving here again I also hadn't driven in a couple of years and couldn't use my NCD from Ireland. I was driving a 1.2L petrol and was paying around £400.

Since then I've been driving 2.0L diesels (a 170 bhp quattro and 150 bhp) over here for years and the quotes are very reasonable, less than half the £900 you've been quoted.

For best results follow moneysavingexpert advice.

I used the comparison sites in the following order. GoCompare, followed by Google insurance, moneysupermarket and Confused.

StudentC

@technoprisoner - thanks for that, I've just tried directline and got around £900 again, so at least not as astronomical as some of the others.

@r3nu4l - thanks for the advice. Haven't bought a car yet so have been putting in sets of random details (one I'm considering buying and my old car at home so that I can make comparisons) - if I get something it will be an estate, cheap, small engine and old. So the age might be driving it up. But I've just been playing around with the directline site (one of the more user friendly sites) and regardless of which factors I change (car size, value or age) I'm still getting quotes around that. So i can;t work out which factors is loading against me.

Have gone through gocompare, money supermarket, and confused, and have read through the stuff on moneysavingexpert. Haven't tried google insurance yet so will do that, thanks. I've got a couple of slightly cheaper quotes (£750ish) through the comparison sites, but that's without them realising that my NCD is Irish rather than UK, so I suspect they may not stay that way!

I'm not in a mad hurry so have time to ring them up, just got a bit of a shock as I was paying so much less at home! If it's that pricy I'll stcik to walking for another while But then again, it seems that if I don;t start driving here it'll never get any cheaper so maybe I have to bite the bullet!

gucci

Its a bloody nightmare, honestly! I was in a similar boat to you, going back on the road after 5-6 years out, and I am paying more for my insurance now age 30 than I was age 23, and I am driving a smaller car!! Like you my no claims was irish (therefore not considered by most) and not relevent because it was too old.

I am sure you dont need us to tell you, but postcode also affects the price of your insurance, and where you park your car at night.

Other things to consider are, how much mileage will you be doing? Most of them consider this in their quotations. Also, I put mrs gucci on the insurance (who will never sit behind the wheel of the car as she commutes and does not like driving in the city!) and it REDUCED the price with most of the providers! For what its worth the best deal i got (last feb) was with Admiral. That was after a good bit of shopping around,ringing,gocomparing, crying, swearing, begging on the streets. Still came in at silly money £800 +

Technoprisoner

thats crazy...my brother is paying £870 on a porsche 911 turbo with his irish discount

theteal

Tesco were the cheapest for my first year here, about £900 on a 1.6 fiesta with 4 years Irish NCD (I didn't meet any companies who didn't accept it). It gradually come down since but I have changed insurer every year, it was £600ish this year with aviva - which I still think is a bit steep for a 30yr old with 6 years NCD. I think next step is to get an English licence to drop it a bit more - why that makes a difference I don't know!

hiluxman

I also had the issue of insurance companies not accepting my Irish no claims bonus, with the company I'm now insured with, I just said I had 4 years NCB and sent them a copy of the form. I didn't say it was from Ireland and the NCB was accepted
In regards to getting an English licence, that made the insurance more expensive for me because on paper it looked like I had only held a driving licence for 6 months when I renewed my insurance, the insurance salesperson told me to leave the licence classed as a full EEC licence and the quote came back down

shanec1928

Dosn't Ncb only last two years after that you start fresh again.

Lemming

hiluxman wrote: »

In regards to getting an English licence, that made the insurance more expensive for me because on paper it looked like I had only held a driving licence for 6 months when I renewed my insurance, the insurance salesperson told me to leave the licence classed as a full EEC licence and the quote came back down

Actually, if you surrender your licence and apply for a conversion to UK license, the date of your original issued licence is stated on the card. I also queried this and was told that your issued UK licence takes account of the duration of your existing licence so you are not starting at day zero.

enda1

Issues such as postcode, daytime keeping location, nightime keeping location, industry, profession etc. all have major impacts on insurance.

I just got insured on a 2L Citroen C5 with no NCD for less than £700 so you must be doing something seriously wrong OP!?

kelledy

I recently done this with a gap of maybe 1 month without driving . I felt online comparison. Sites the best .
Similar with me o was getting quoted up to 200 more stating EU licence .so i swapped my licence and kept shopping round.
Im 27 with 5 year ncb and got it for 450 in the end.

r3nu4l

Yeah, I have to say I never even thought about trying to transfer my NCD bonus to the UK as I thought they wouldn't accept it. My insurance was still cheaper.

Not sure what you are doing wrong OP. Perhaps you should look into getting an old fashioned insurance broker and asking them to get a quote. They will be able to advise you on what is going wrong.

StudentC

Thanks all for the responses.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong either, I thought I was a fairly 'safe' driver for insurance companies (females, 30s, 10+ years clean driving history, 'respectable' job, and what i understood was a fairly ok postcode). My insurance in ireland (with the same details, bar the postcode) has always been fairly cheap.

i'll keep plugging away at it using the advice above, so thanks for that. I'm tempted to forget the whole thing (a car is a nicety at the moment, not a necessity), but as someone else also mentioned, my NCB will run out if I'm not careful and then I'll be right back to square one. So I might have to just pay up now to keep the NCB going and start to get the UK driving years under my belt, to prevent it getting even more expensive!

enda1

StudentC wrote: »

Thanks all for the responses.

I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong either, I thought I was a fairly 'safe' driver for insurance companies (females, 30s, 10+ years clean driving history, 'respectable' job, and what i understood was a fairly ok postcode). My insurance in ireland (with the same details, bar the postcode) has always been fairly cheap.

i'll keep plugging away at it using the advice above, so thanks for that. I'm tempted to forget the whole thing (a car is a nicety at the moment, not a necessity), but as someone else also mentioned, my NCB will run out if I'm not careful and then I'll be right back to square one. So I might have to just pay up now to keep the NCB going and start to get the UK driving years under my belt, to prevent it getting even more expensive!

-If your job mentions some words such as sales, working in the motor industry, or any sort of sport for example you could be classed risky. Try choose a descriptor of your job and industry from the list which makes you sound more like an administrative/accounting/consultant type (of course without lying as that's illegal).
-Gender is supposed to no longer be an insurable risk criteria.
-Where you keep you car daytime and night-time are highly critical too. If your car is on the public road this is worst if it's in a locked garage best.
-London is generally bad regarding postcode. Within London I'm not sure of the differences.
-Don't just look at 3rd party, often fully comprehensive is cheaper.
-Adjust the excess to a level that you're comfortable with. There seems to be about 'a fifth of the reduction in excess loaded to the premium' correlation, or at least there was for me.
-Car initial value and type obviously have a massive factor in the cost.
-How you use the car too (social only, commuting and social, business - in increasing cost)