Car accident - Category N

[sg31]

One thing that I do now realise and hadn't appreciated before. The protected NCD is just that - it protects the 9 years "discount". So at renewal the premium will go up to reflect the accident and we will then get our protected discount on that increased premium. For some reason I'd always thought that I was protecting the no claims history (so that the premium would be calculated as if we had not had an accident for the past 9+ years).

That's how we used to do it when I was an underwriter.

At that time pre 1987 we allowed experienced drivers to have 1 accident without any penalty other than loss of 2 years NCB, 2 accidents in 3 years we would apply a 25% premium loading and bonus would reduce to nil. In those days the NCB scale was over 4 years, 33%,40%, 50%, 60%. Claims stepback was 2 years.

The rationale was that having 1 accident could happen to anyone and that's why we were there. 2 accidents was considered a bit careless, 3 and we were looking at you very carefully. Obviously we would also consider any record of motoring convictions and how long a customer had been with us. If you had been a client for 10 years with an unblemished record we would be very accomodating.

It seems like ancient history to consider a client staying with one company for 10 years but we had many clients who had insured with us for more than 50 years.

[Laughton]

I'm sure that many would prefer to stay with the same insurer but nowadays we seem to be penalised for doing so. Even being with the same agent doesn't seem to help - come renewal they search around all their associated insurers to get the best price.

Even the existing insurer will offer a better price for a new customer with exactly the same age, claims history etc. etc. Does it really make any sense? They must know that come renewal the majority will be searching around for the best deal once again.

[scottnsilky]

I think the penny has finally dropped with a few insurance companies and they realise offering a better deal to new customers, than to 'loyal' one does not work any more, although it's taken us a long time to cotton on, now its so easy to shop around on the internet why does anyone auto-renew?

Last September my insurer, Admiral wanted to increase the premium by more than 10%, I got on the blower and said if they would accept a lower figure I would stay with them, just to save me the bother of changing companies, they refused. I asked the agent, would you rather have £350 or nothing, they chose nothing, so I went over to Direct Line, who insured me for a lot less than the £350 I offered Admiral, although I don't think the cover is as good.

The comments from sg31 sound so rational, why can't we go back to the eighties?

dp

[sg31]

I think the penny has finally dropped with a few insurance companies and they realise offering a better deal to new customers, than to 'loyal' one does not work any more, although it's taken us a long time to cotton on, now its so easy to shop around on the internet why does anyone auto-renew?

Last September my insurer, Admiral wanted to increase the premium by more than 10%, I got on the blower and said if they would accept a lower figure I would stay with them, just to save me the bother of changing companies, they refused. I asked the agent, would you rather have £350 or nothing, they chose nothing, so I went over to Direct Line, who insured me for a lot less than the £350 I offered Admiral, although I don't think the cover is as good.

The comments from sg31 sound so rational, why can't we go back to the eighties?

dp

When I started in insurance all of the company branch offices had paper records, computers were used at head office only for analysis and accounting. To issue a new policy we or an agent had to give a quotation, most of the time that was the end of the matter because one of the many other insurers might be slightly cheaper. If we got the busines a proposal form was submitted and needed checking, cover note was issued maually, proof of bonus submitted and checked, The policy was drafted with any extensions or restrictions added and then sent for typing. It was then checked, sent out and records created. If anything needed clarification letters had to be sent and received. It was a lot of work,

Then computers arrived at branch offices and it became quicker and easier but was still a significant job. Once that settled down companies started to connect to the brokers computers and the work of issuing many of the policies went from the insurer to the broker agent. Now issuing the policy was labour free as far as the company was concerned and customer retention wasno longer that important. New business generation was the new in thing. I left just before that happened but you could see what was coming.

The comparison sites were in effect brokers who dumped all the workload on the customer and the computers.

There is no loyalty to the insurance company but why should there be, the company has no consideration for it's customers. It's the modern world and there's no going back to the old world.

Who am I to complain, if I want to buy something I look on the internet and price it there, if I can buy locally at a similar price I will but generally I can't so I buy on line.

[didds]

Yes, when discussing the point with the broker (RAC) I did say "yes but that means you can just increase our starting premium by 4 or 5 or 6 or 7 times and then allocate our 60% NCD to arrive at a final premium far in excess of this years.

No, he said, that would be just silly.

We shall see come November (I rather think that staffordian might be right).

Presumably that would only "work" if every other insurer did the same so there was no benefit in running comparisons with a view to moving etc.

However, who knows!

didds