Car Insurance

[Andy46]

Hi,

Is around £1k about right for car insurance? I'm 36, have never owned a car as in the past I've used my parents / ex girlfriends. I work / live close to town so getting to work and back is easier on public transport, however I am considering buying a car for weekends etc, yet the cost of insurance seems ridiculous.

Thanks

[staffordian]

It's impossible to say how competitive this is without knowing more.

New drivers, especially those under 25 can pay several thousand pounds for cover on cars which fall into low insurance groups so it's certainly not an unbelievable premium for even an older driver with no experience.

The only way to judge if the premium you quote is reasonable or not is to compare several companies, by using a couple of the comparison site, then looking at some of the insurers which don't figure on the comparison sites. I can't recall the ones that don't except Direct Line, but an internet search should reveal others.

It's well worth playing with the options on one of these comparison sites; try altering the voluntary excess you are prepared to pay in the event of a claim (but bear in mind there will probably be quite a high compulsory excess anyway)

Try other vehicles if you've not already bought one. Can you add someone else as a named driver. perhaps a partner? This can lower premiums.

If all else fails, it may be worth approaching a broker. If you have driving experience but because you haven't owned a vehicle you have not been able to build up a no claims record, some insurers might offer an introductory discount, on which you can then build a no claims discount of your own in subsequent years.

HTH

Staffordian

[BT63]

£1k sounds expensive for someone who is 36.
But there are a lot of variables.

Is it an expensive car?
Is the car in your name or someone else's?
Is it a fast/powerful car?
Is it a car that has poor security features?
Is the quote for unusually high mileage or unusually low mileage?
Do you work in an occupation that puts you at higher statistical risk of an accident (e.g. working long hours/shifts?
Have you been qualified only a short time?
Do you have any motoring offences to declare?
Do you live in a high-crime area?
Are you married/kids?
Does your insurance include lots of policy add-ons (hire car, breakdown etc)?

Every question they ask builds a risk profile for you.

As an example of how low insurance costs can be, with Aviva, my wife's little 1-litre town runabout cost her £173 for the year.

[bungeejumper]

Surely the absence of a no claims bonus (I presume?) is the killer in this instance? The last time I looked (which I admit wasn't recently), a full NCB reduced the headline quote figure by 50-60%. Can you get some NCB in respect of your driving your girlfriends'/parents' car?

At 36 you shouldn't be getting penalised for your age. Postcode probably has more to do with the general level of premiums than any other factor. I'm in a rock-bottom-risk rural area and keep my car on a drive, and the wife and I are paying £240-£275 for a Golf and a fair-sized Toyota estate respectively. There are cheaper insurance options available on the Meerkat, but we don't take them because of the things the policies don't include, or because the claims excesses are too large.

It sounds to me as though you could bring your premiums down by specifying a limited mileage - it you're not likely to be using the car during the week, 5000 miles a year ought to be enough. Ask a proper insurance broker to get you some quotes.

BJ

[redsturgeon]

Go on one of the comparison sites, fill in the form and you should get a couple of dozen quotes. That will give you a good idea of the range of costs. With no NCD I would say you are looking at around 500 as the cheapest for a "sensible" car in a "normal" area with a clean license.

John

[midnightcatprowl]

Insurance broker is always a good idea when facing a challenge of this type. As others have said your problem lies mainly in the lack of no claim bonus because you haven't owned a car to this point.

One small thing which might help a little bit. Consider what you are stating as your job or profession as this does affect the quotes you will be given. I don't mean say that you are a Call Centre worker when actually you are a deep sea diver working on oil rigs! Many roles can be described in different ways and the way you habitually describe yourself may not be the same way that someone else in the same role would describe themselves. Also many people do more than one job e.g. I was talking to someone the other week who is a self-employed graphic artist but who, for financial reasons, works some sessions per week in a local school running workshops for the pupils. If 'graphic artist' was a bad choice from the insurance point of view she could quite legitimately describe herself as an educator or whatever from the insurers lists best fitted her school based role. There is an interesting bit about this on Martin Lewis' Money Saving Expert website.

[melonfool]

I am 48, 8+ years NCD, drive a Honda Civic. £240pa with Aviva.

So, it's really hard to tell! I've never paid anything like £1k though, nor even more than £500 I don't think.

Mel

[baldchap]

I was 30 before I got a car in the UK, but this was about 16 years ago, so prices may be somewhat dated.

Anyway FWIW I paid about £600 on a 2 litre car, which rapidly declined after a few years NCB. You just have to take the hit in the beginning.

What I did notice was that I had a significant reduction in cost by having my father as an additional named driver, even though he never drove it.

[martint123]

What I did notice was that I had a significant reduction in cost by having my father as an additional named driver, even though he never drove it.

I got a reduction for adding my brother, who also only drives it one day a year, but it was insignificant.

If the OP was a named driver when driving parent/GF vehicle, it may be possible that calling that insurance company may provide some NCD -
ISTR Direct Line gives (gave?) NCD for named drivers.

[didds]

What I did notice was that I had a significant reduction in cost by having my father as an additional named driver, even though he never drove it.

when i oposted something similar on TMF it got pulled by admins as such posts were promoting fraud!

didds

[baldchap]

What I did notice was that I had a significant reduction in cost by having my father as an additional named driver, even though he never drove it.

when i oposted something similar on TMF it got pulled by admins as such posts were promoting fraud!

didds

To avoid any panic , he was named as I required him to drive it to the MOT station for testing if I was abroad.

[melonfool]

Surely you can name a driver *in case* they ever need to drive your car? I had my partner as named driver. The fact is, both cars sat on the driveway and whoever went out usually took his as it was nicer, bigger and he got free fuel from his employer. If that was him then when I went out I took my car.

However I don't think he ever drove mine as he didn't like it - he's very tall and gets a bad back so folding himself into my car was not top of his list of fun activities. So, we just worked it out so if I knew he was going out I took my own car so he could use his.

But the fact was he *might* have used it, he may have needed to and thus it was useful to have him properly insured on it.

Mel

[Alaric]

Surely you can name a driver *in case* they ever need to drive your car?

That's why you do it. The Insurance Companies had a curious pricing policy where the addition of an extra driver was sometimes at a negative or at least zero cost. I might suspect the additional driver had to be resident at the same address, but I cannot recall having to make a declaration to that effect.

[melonfool]

Surely you can name a driver *in case* they ever need to drive your car?

That's why you do it. The Insurance Companies had a curious pricing policy where the addition of an extra driver was sometimes at a negative or at least zero cost. I might suspect the additional driver had to be resident at the same address, but I cannot recall having to make a declaration to that effect.

Yes, it reduced my price by c£20 I seem to recall.

And when he added me to his it did the same. Go figure!

Mel

[bungeejumper]

I also have my wife down as a named driver for strictly emergency purposes - she'd hate actually having to drive it (too big for comfort), but I guess we'd deal with that issue if the need ever arose. I wouldn't want to be stuck in France with a broken leg and no other hope of getting home.

One little drawback of having a nominated driver is that you become responsible for declaring all their history. If they haven't told you about their speeding tickets, that could count against you in the event of a claim. And when my wife's car was rear-ended a few years back, my car's insurance had its protected no claims discount suspended until her claim had been sorted!

Indeed, it was worse than that - my insurer (thanks, Lloyds ) actually accused me of trying to deceive them because I hadn't notified them of the nudge. And I'd honestly assumed that it would be of no interest to them, since it was her car, and it had been insured with another company, and since there were no offences and no points involved. Alas, I reckoned without the claims database, which meant that they were getting a full view of everything. Be warned. Won't be going back to Lloyds, though.

BJ

[oldapple]

" Alas, I reckoned without the claims database, which meant that they were getting a full view of everything." (BJ)

I can't understand why insurance companies insist on drivers providing NCD evidence when they can easily check on a claims database? We have had a nightmare obtaining evidence from M&S for Saga who, we discovered 5 months after taking their policy, wanted evidence for 20 years no claims. M&S only give up to nine years as do many others, but even then, they threw every spanner possible in the works despite many phone calls promising to sort it out.

[staffordian]

What I did notice was that I had a significant reduction in cost by having my father as an additional named driver, even though he never drove it.

when i oposted something similar on TMF it got pulled by admins as such posts were promoting fraud!

didds

Perhaps there was a degree of misunderstanding. The only fraudulent angle would be in claiming an older driver or one with a better driving record was the main driver when they were not.

Simply adding an extra person who may or may not occasionally drive the car isn't fraudulent. It might be taking advantage of an insurer's underwriting policies, but if an insurer didn't want to take that into account, it could soon change it's criteria.

Staffordian

[martint123]

I might suspect the additional driver had to be resident at the same address, but I cannot recall having to make a declaration to that effect.

When I added my brother (different address) there was no requirement or facility to provide an address on the form.

[swill453]

I might suspect the additional driver had to be resident at the same address, but I cannot recall having to make a declaration to that effect.

When I added my brother (different address) there was no requirement or facility to provide an address on the form.

I have three additional drivers on my policy, only one of whom lives at my address.

They may or may not drive my car in any particular year, but it seems to cost almost nothing. In fact as others have said the first additional driver reduced the cost.

Scott.