No "New Customers" that have a claim

bardcom

I've been driving claim-free for nearly 30 years on a policy in my own name. Both my wife and I had our own cars and we've always been named drivers on each other's policy. Both of us changed jobs recently with no requirement for us to drive to work so we decided to get rid of one of the cars (mine) and drive hers. My insurance was up in early October 2016.

In November 2016, I crashed the car (my fault) and insurance settled the claim for about €11,500. She has protection so it won't impact her quote.

Because I don't want to lose my own no-claims bonus, we want to alternate the main driver on the policy each year, so this year I'll be the main driver.

I started phoning for quotes today.

My old insurance company will quote €990. I got a quote for roughly the same from Chill.ie (they're a broker) as well (policy would be with Lloyds). My last policy was €398.

But not one of the other insurance companies will quote. The reason provided is that they are not accepting new business from anyone with a claim in the last 3 or 5 years (depending on the company quoting).

Funny that all of the insurance companies appear to have starting doing this at the same time - is it just me or does this sound very much like the behaviour of a cartel. Their decision very effectively removes competition from the market and forces a customer to either accept the quotation from their previous company (regardless) or go down the (farcical) route of getting 3 letters of refusal, going to the "insurance ireland" and they will force one of the refusers to provider a quote.

grogi

Try theaa.ie, axa (you will probably need to call to get a quote) and post insurance.

bardcom

I just received a pretty decent quote from thequotedevil for just over €700 (got the name from another thread here) for fully comp with full bonus protection, wife as named driver, etc.

I'll try theaa.ie also now, thanks!

Sue Pa Key Pa

If you have a quote from your insurer, Insurance Ireland will not assist. Their function is not to get you a premium you are happy with. As for insurers refusing to quote with previous claims, this is nothing new. Insurers have always had a limit on previous claims before they quote

bardcom

Sue Pa Key Pa wrote: »

As for insurers refusing to quote with previous claims, this is nothing new. Insurers have always had a limit on previous claims before they quote

Rather vague "... a limit on previous claims before they quote ..." but I wasn't aware that if you have one claim (in the past 3 or 5 years) they won't quote at all. Doesn't even matter if your claim was for €500 or for €500,000

If it's such a bright line rule, why don't they make it clear on their websites that if you have a claim and are a new customer, they won't quote you? It would have saved me a couple of hours of my life earlier today. Similarly, it should be the first question when you speak with them on the phone.

But there's a bigger picture here. For example, my wife got a renewal notice as usual - I could have continued to drive as a named driver. Same risk for an insurance company whether I'm a named driver under my wife's policy or if my wife is a named driver under a policy in my name. But I bet that if they *were* to quote, it would be for a much bigger amount. So how then would my quote be related to "risk" exactly? I don't get it.

odyssey06

It can be easy \ cheaper for insurers to just walk away from this portion of the market... simpler IT systems, less need for underwriters... anything that's not a happy path means you have to ask more questions, you might need a human to take a look at it, verify the claims reported are the actuals. Why bother when you can cherry-pick?
If you made the claim with them, at renewal they already have looked at the situation manually and assessed it.

grogi

odyssey06 wrote: »

Why bother when you can cherry-pick?

Because you'll end up with three persons you want to insure... Not really enough to cover for the CEO salary...

Sue Pa Key Pa

bardcom wrote: »

Rather vague "... a limit on previous claims before they quote ..." but I wasn't aware that if you have one claim (in the past 3 or 5 years) they won't quote at all. Doesn't even matter if your claim was for €500 or for €500,000

If it's such a bright line rule, why don't they make it clear on their websites that if you have a claim and are a new customer, they won't quote you? It would have saved me a couple of hours of my life earlier today. Similarly, it should be the first question when you speak with them on the phone.

But there's a bigger picture here. For example, my wife got a renewal notice as usual - I could have continued to drive as a named driver. Same risk for an insurance company whether I'm a named driver under my wife's policy or if my wife is a named driver under a policy in my name. But I bet that if they *were* to quote, it would be for a much bigger amount. So how then would my quote be related to "risk" exactly? I don't get it.

All insurers are clear on their websites regarding previous claims and ask for specific details. If your history is outside their underwriting limit, you on't get a quote. It has always been that way.Some refuse if you have any claim, others might say no more than 2 claims in the last 5yrs, totalling no more than €5,000

As for your wife getting a renewal notice, her insurers are obliged to offer terms, even though they might not be quoting new people with a similar profile

odyssey06

grogi wrote: »

Because you'll end up with three persons you want to insure... Not really enough to cover for the CEO salary...

Seems like there's a lot more than 3 people out there who haven't had a claim in the last 3-5 years... or most of the insurance companies wouldn't be following this strategy.
The other side of cherry picking is that if you do it, and everyone else keeps doing it, you are left with customers you'd probably prefer went elsewhere.. kinda like prisoners dilemma.

dev100

bardcom wrote:

In November 2016, I crashed the car (my fault) and insurance settled the claim for about €11,500. She has protection so it won't impact her quote.

You realise very quickly getting quotes from other insurance companies is near impossible if you aren't claims free . Just count yourself very lucky it's not a claim pending or an open claim that could take years to resolve.

I had the same trouble when I tipped off the back of a qashqai ... done 2K worth of damage to other person's car and 1K to my own. I was with Aon at the time and they were getting out of dealing with private insurance and all their business was passed to another company So at my renewal my insurance went up. Even though I had full no claims protection , the excuse was premiums had gone up but I still retained full no claims !!! It went up every year for last 4 years . When I finally left that company I realised they had loaded me because I had an accident even though I had never claimed off them . You can't write some of the stuff that they do .... They have you by the goolies when you have an accident and it's only then you realise that ...

Sue Pa Key Pa

dev100 wrote: »

When I finally left that company I realised they had loaded me because I had an accident even though I had never claimed off them . You can't write some of the stuff that they do ....

How did you discover they were doing that?

mikeybrennan

Bonus protection only protects the ncb

It doesn't mean the Insurance quote won't be affected

PCeeeee

mikeybrennan wrote: »

Bonus protection only protects the ncb

It doesn't mean the Insurance quote won't be affected

This. Premium will go up. Then the no claims discount will be applied to the inflated premium.

coylemj

PCeeeee wrote: »

This. Premium will go up. Then the no claims discount will be applied to the inflated premium.

+1 NCB protection is a complete con. Once you have a claim, your own insurance company knows you won't get a quote from anyone else on your next renewal so they can screw you.

dev100

Sue Pa Key Pa wrote:

How did you discover they were doing that?

My insurance jumped from 450ish to nearly 1100 or 1200 in the space of 3 to 4 yr and What made me suspicious was the fact I work in a big company and one of the lads was only paying half what I was paying with the same company y and he was driving an mx3 or 5 so I decided to challenge them when my renewal went to stupid money and they admitted it was because I had previously had an accident.

Sue Pa Key Pa

dev100 wrote: »

My insurance jumped from 450ish to nearly 1100 or 1200 in the space of 3 to 4 yr and What made me suspicious was the fact I work in a big company and one of the lads was only paying half what I was paying with the same company y and he was driving an mx3 or 5 so I decided to challenge them when my renewal went to stupid money and they admitted it was because I had previously had an accident.

You need to challenge them on that further, if they loaded your premium when there was no claim.

mikeybrennan

Sue Pa Key Pa wrote: »

You need to challenge them on that further, if they loaded your premium when there was no claim.

There's nothing to challenge
He had an accident