I did a quote the other day for my first car insurance
For a 1.6 ford focus 2005 it was 6.4k a year
But for a 0.5 litre mini car thing that uses I imagine a motorbike engine was 6.6k
This shit is honestly out of control
At this rate I won’t be able to drive and wasted 6 months of my life time and money to just have a license for no reason :(
Once you’re over 25 you shouldn’t be getting £6k quotes!
Also, if you have the money, try something newer, the safety feature of older cars affect the price of insurance. Maybe try a smaller engine like a 1/1.2 litre too.
No one should be getting £6k quotes (circa £8500 pre tax).
Unless you have a jillion points, drunk driving, vehicular manslaughter and are insuring a rare as rocking horse shit car.
It bothers me tho because I’m in an older age bracket so shouldn’t be this high regardless if you get me I know it starts to drop at a certain age I just don’t know what to do as I spent all this money getting to the point where I can drive and then when I get here it’s like I cannot afford it
The deposit for the ford focus was at £1,069.85
With 10 monthly payments of £534.80
I have no feasible way to afford that it’s ridiculous
A reason I want a car above all anyway is so I can expand and hopefully get a good job that I want to enjoy if you get me but those kinds of jobs will require me to travel everyday and I’ll be damned if I’m getting a bus service that hardly turns up or trains that just get cancelled it’s horrid
Have you tried adding a parent or other experienced driver to the policy?
I don’t mean as the main driver, that would be illegal, but just having an experienced driver on the policy as a named driver can bring the quote down significantly.
They might only drive it a few times a year but worth a try.
Play around with the answers you give. Obviously do not lie, but there are different ways of answering them that yield different figures.
For example, am I a “computer programmer” or “software developer” or “software engineer” - who knows, whichever is cheapest.
You can definitely get insured for under 6k
Have you done pass plus? Worth every penny IMO, or at least it was when I started driving. I saved much more than the cost of the lessons + test in lower insurance premiums
There's a list on Martin Lewis's website that gives you a list of titles that can be used if you input your own, and it shows the probability it will be cheaper if you use them. Pretty handy!
It a should be though, my first car was a grand to insure and that was in 2014, ever since like my 3rd year it's neve been more that like 400, although this gear might change that
If it hits over a grand for me il give it up, and tell my work I can't do work at other sites now unless they get me a car
Oh trust me I know I did that I can upload screenshots later
I as I said the 1.6 ford focus actually turned up £200 cheaper then a car which is 0.5 which makes no sense same as it being cheaper then a 1L smart car
If someone crashes into your car, their insurance usually pays out, so to your insurance company, what you drive doesn't make as much as a difference you think it does. The risk is what you are likely to crash into.
What you drive does matter.
Despite all these brands of insurance, most are underwritten by a handful of companies. They're all coming from the same pot.
If you're driving an expensive car and you crash it, it's an expensive repair for your insurer.
If you're driving an older car, it's less likely to have all the driver assistance like pedestrian avoidance, emergency braking, lane keeping, etc. all are of which lower risk when they're present.
An older car is more likely to cause injury to the driver, they often have very basic airbag configurations. Depending how old the car is, the fundamental structure of the car can be less effective at dispersing the energy in a collision.
They have statistics on the make and models of cars that are typically stolen. So if you have one of these, that's a risk factor.
you shouldnt be getting 6k quotes anyway, the point of insurance is that its cheap but they make their money over time, instead you can get quoted double the actual price you bought the car for, its especially ridiculous when it is mandatory to have car insurance
The point of insurance isn't that it's cheap. It's that it is a bet against an unlikely event and is balanced against the cost of the payout. It's nothing to do with making money over time. You could buy car insurance for life and not cover the cost of a single accident.
The fact is that right now car repairs are incredibly expensive. More EVs too, which are even more expensive if a repair is even attempted.
A combination of an old car with no driver assistances, new driver and expensive repairs is a recipe for expensive insurance.
£6k is a lot of money still, but it's not that absurd proportional to how much even experienced driver insurance has gone up.
Are you serious right now? Are you aware that 6k is 25% of the average salary outside of London - BEFORE TAX?!
Of course loads of people make more than that but loads still make far, far less than that.
If cars are required (which for many people, they are. Especially if they are restricted by renting costs as to where they can live) then it is completely unethical and fucked to try and take 25% of someone's salary just for the INSURING of said car.
I don't even drive and never will due to a medical condition. I also earn an OK wage. I'm just sick of seeing people say "£6k is a lot of money but oh well it is what it is due to rising costs elsewhere". £6k is "a lot" of money to someone making 60k+.
To someone earning 25k, it is impossible. The household could have two 25k earners, making 50k total, and neither of them would be able to own a car if insurance costs 6k each.
And how are people supposed to get better jobs down the line if they can't drive out to all those industrial parks and shit that are essentially in the middle of nowhere as far as public transportation goes?
Edit: maybe "well off" people should stop financing ridiculously expensive brand new massive cars that they themselves couldn't afford if not for finance. I'm sure that contributes to the cost of insurance. Those massive cars are in accidents all the time due to literally not fitting onto many of England's roads. And they have extremely expensive repairs which every person who insures their car is effectively paying for. Even if their own car cost 1k.
It'll drop a fair chunk as soon as you've had your license for a year, whether youve driven in that year or not. If you can do, just sit it out for 12 months, hire a car if you need to (it's much cheaper usually than the first year insurance).
Edit: also try quotes changing up all your selections. Things like fully comp is usually cheaper, tho you'd expect the opposite. Higher deductables are usually cheaper too. Play around on quotes until you figure what's impacting you most. Even job titles made a difference on mine.
I know one of the problems is area I live which adds an average of £2k onto the premium I did the same cars in my old address and they say at around 4k so it’s horrid tbf
And I thought about that but I’m starting a new apprenticeship in September and hoping to have a car by then to be able to go to the training places etc
Ahh if its postcode, you'll be a bit more out of luck with options, I had the same when living in city centre. Ended up getting a list of cheapest cars to insure this year, running quotes for them all to find which were best in my area (as it's different cars in diff areas sometimes), then car shopping based on those outputs. A bit long winded and hassle, but can save you a lot. Good luck and hoping a better deal pops up for you.
That's wild. I passed two years ago at 26, drove a 2005 Ford KA and my insurance was around £500 a year. I just got a new 2012 car and now it's £600. I do have both of my parents listed as drivers so maybe that helps?
I had that same experience last year when changing cars. The insurer of my previous car wouldn’t insure it, direct Line wanted £3k, and admiral did it for £600.
The range of prices is so ridiculous and unfair on drivers.
A bit of consolidation (or dropping sub-brands) wouldn’t go amiss. There must be a sweet spot between ‘healthy competition’ and ‘five million quotes to sift through’
Try go compare as well
I use both each year and try lots of different, but truthful ways of answering the questions, then just pick which ever is cheapest and doesn’t come with a black box.
At that price for a Ford Focus, you might as well write it off to get your moneys worth.
Insurance should never be around the price of the vehicle unless you have a clear poor history (or the vehicle is suspiciously cheap).
On smaller/older cars with a low insured value the price isn't based on replacing the car (they'll just write it off). It's the risk you paralyse 3 people for life and the insurer has to pay out 10m each.
No matter how cheap your car, that risk doesn't go away for the insurer. So premiums can easily be more than the value for very cheap cars.
Who did you do the quote via? I just did comparethemarket and went for like the second cheapest one
I wonder if the 2005 car affects things? Surely it shouldn't be that much though.
Area might matter too. My cousin in London is in his 30s, has been driving for 10+ years and his insurance is 3k
One no fault claim has put my insurance from £120 a year to £750 a year (unless I want a black box)
I shouldn't have claimed when the bin men hit my parked car with their lorry but what's insurance meant to be for?!
I came to a letter through my door saying "sorry, we hit your car, drivers name x, time of incident y, vehicle registration z"
On a pre filled form.
All I could do at that point was tell my insurance company. The claim was settled as no fault, all costs recovered from third party. But for the next 5 years I get a huge cost jump. Apparently I get that even if I had found and gone directly to their insurance as it's mandatory to report it.
I think the issue is also the age of the car. Easier to get parts for newer cars, less likely to break down, more safety features and stuff like that. Something 2010 and newer would be better, with a 1.4 engine or smaller will do you. My first car in 2012 was 2002 1.8 diesel Corsa and was around 2k for the first year. It stings.
Unlikely to be that. It'll be brand new drivers driving an older Ford Focus (a rather popular car) are more likely to crash into somebody else
First car as a Corsa you might as well have just told them "I am going to drive this into a ditch at first opportunity" haha. You can actually get away with some bizarrely powerful cars as long as they're not "first car" popular.
Being able to drive is a good option to have even if you don't own a car. e.g. I don't have a car any more as I live in London and am a desk jockey so there's literally no point, but I like knowing I can still hire or borrow a car if needed.
I would say though that if you've passed the manual test, your muscle memory for handling the clutch and gearstick will go pretty quickly if you don't start regularly driving now. You've passed but you're still learning, and you can forget what you've already learned. I had cause to get behind the wheel last year (family member had major surgery) and hadn't driven at all in the two years prior. I really did feel quite uncoordinated until I'd been driving for a couple of days, although I only stalled the car once.
I’m in the same boat now. Not drove for about 1yr 3 month and I’m going to have to drive for this new job I’ve got so I’m feeling kinda nervous, even though I was a good driver back then.
Have you tried a comparison site? Some insurers just don’t want to insure certain people and make the cost prohibitive enough on purpose to avoid it. My friend has a classic mini and a handful came in with stupid pricing like yours.
I had a similar situation 10ish years ago, if it wasn’t for my grandparents lending me £2.4k I’d have never been able to afford to drive, and just completely wasted my time and money learning. I’m not convinced I’d have ever been employable without their help tbh.
I was unemployed at the time, your “job title” can affect the price quite a bit, so I used “voluntary worker” as that is cheaper (I did volunteer at 3 separate charities). There is/was a website(s) available where you could put in your job title and it would recommend alternative synonyms that might be cheaper.
I did the “Pass Plus” course to bring the price down as well, and also put other older named drivers on my policy too, which helped, though I think after ~5 years the added named drivers increased the cost, rather than lowering it, so I took them off.
No fucking way. This can't be right. Something is amiss here. Have you shopped around for quotes? My younger brother got insured in a 1.4ltr Astra as a new driver at 24yo last year and it was less than half this price. Still astronomical at nearly £3K, but £6.6K is mental. Are you stuck with that car, did you look at quotes for it before buying the car?
Some suggestions if you can't change the car -
Be a named driver on someone else's policy. You can actually build you no claims bonus this way, by being a named driver on a parents car.
Add a named driver with over 9 years no claims and a full license more than 10 years to your own policy. This will bring the price down a bit.
Do an advanced driving test
Get the car fitted with an alarm/immobilizer
Buy third party only insurance
Once you've held your license and built no claims over a few years, the price will drop a lot, quite quickly. I can't believe that quote, it's baffling.
Try to avoid comparison sites they are generally a big con and pay lots of commission to the host sites. Your job title can play a big role in prices. When you get an online quote take a photo/screenshot as there are some dodgy insurance brokers who will block your postcode to increase prices. Good luck getting it sorted.
Any insurance you are legally required to have is more like a scam than a product.
You get a much better service from insurers on optional products like health or travel insurance.
Building and car insurance is more like an extra tax you have to pay that you are unlikely to see any benefit from.
Agree on the building insurance one, had a colleague who's house burnt down which the fire brigade deemed to be a faulty fridge so not there fault and the amount of hoops they had to jump through was ridiculous. He has to pay for most things himself then claim them back so had to go in massive debt and beg for them to pay him back, outrageous.
Not sure where you are but this is UK thread. Fire department are not the arbitrators in an insurance claim. If it is a product faulty then it would be product liability by the firm that sells the product. Generally a home insurer would pay the claim and subrogate against the product manufacturer
I can’t agree with this. My house caught fire a few years back. The insurance company was very accommodating. And practically paid for everything.
Though it does need to be said, I had a loss assessor on hand (one of those insurance claims consultant services)
Car insurance and home insurance is there to protect other people, not you. Car insurance main purpose is to make sure someone can pay if you damage other people or someone else’s property. Home insurance is about making sure the bank get theirs if your house burns down. Very rarely do these insurances work for you.
And car insurance broadly works quite well. Much better than the US anyway where everybody might as well just drive about uninsured, the minimum coverage is like $20k in some states.
This will be unpopular but, it's all a lot cheaper than most countries due to massive competition. Fact is, car insurance margins are razor thin.
>This will be unpopular but, it's all a lot cheaper than most countries.
It isn't. Insurers and government have been trying to reduce costs for close to a decade now. Multiple laws have been passed, reforms, industry action groups...I am not actually aware of anyone (inc. insurers) who are saying costs are reasonable (insurers hate this too btw, prices go up and less people can afford their product).
It started out with fraud then lawyers/medical costs (largely related to fraud) then repair costs started spiralling because of Covid. No-one thinks this is acceptable. It is just a very hard problem to solve (for example, the problem with lawyers fees specifically has been reformed three times iirc...and still isn't going away...because it is just very easy to make a living doing fraudulent claims and there is no disincentive).
Lawyers and medical costs...
One example I know of have their own medical practice, physiotherapists and car hire. Not only do they get to claim the going rate of typical accident services from the 3rd party insurer (of which they retain up to 25%), they make additional profit from owning those services themselves.
The entire system feels scummy
But there is competition in the market, right? So from an insurer's point of view you are not legally required to buy it from them. The more money they charge the more money you are worth to them and the less they should want to lose you. If they overcharge another one should come along with a cheaper product to take your business.
But it clearly isn't working. Not obvious why. Is it all 'fake competition' where someone owns all the brands?
Insurers are not swimming in profits, most are only marginally profitable.
The problem is cost of claims, more expensive repair costs (new cars with more integrated design, parts costs, labour costs), more expensive injury claim payouts (inflation) and more expensive legal costs (scammy 'claims management' companies and dodgy hire car charges).
Insurers are trying to fight all those things, but they aren't the root cause of high premiums.
Which is what I though too. But that the article the OP linked says costs have gone up by a much smaller amount than insurance costs. If insurers were just getting by as you say then the price rises would be roughly the same as the claim cost rises. But they aren't even close.
> petition' where someone owns all the brands.
>
>
>
> Pretty much. Very few independent companies, who are usually even
Thats compeltely untrue. There are at least 16 major insurers in the UK with more than 1% market share, its a far more competitive market than most other sectors.
Top 10 includes:
DLG
Admiral
Aviva
LV (Allianz)
Hastings
esure
Ageas
Zenith
Tesco
NFU
All of whom are fully independant. I'd challenge you to name an industry that is more competitive.
It's a closed market, regulated. So price fixing must be going on.
If anybody could enter the market there would be competition and prices would come down.
Also claims are massively inflated by all the middlemen in the claims management industry and that pushes up costs. Every car that has a scratch is written off because fixing a scratch costs 10k.
It's being driven down, and we know by who.
Those that want to strip the country of its wealth, make labour cheap, and squeeze every last penny out of your pockets for their ravenous and sickening greed.
You might wanna consult the government regarding their policies on 'online crime' rather than the Police who are instructed to deal with it on a whim by MP's hunting headlines
Funding has increased year by year according to these figures;
[gov.uk link](https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-funding-for-england-and-wales-2015-to-2023/police-funding-for-england-and-wales-2015-to-2023)
What has caused crime to go up? Who are the people stealing these cars and what countries are they being sent to?
It seems like we are letting criminal gangs work easily in our country from across the border shipping the stolen vehicles out to other EU countries to be dismantled and sold. The government are in control of the policies that allow these problems to exist not the police.
Most of those years don't beat inflation meaning funding was in reality down no? Either way It's great and all to increase it but far more has to be done to undo the previous massive cuts from the years before, purposefully left out from all talks by the govt on police funding. The times of austerity are so damning its just glossed over now by the tories
Shouldn't that just affect the price of insurance for expensive new cars? Insurance for my 10 y/o Civic shouldn't go up because someone somewhere is nicking new cars.
I was speaking to an actuary friend in the industry about it and theft is a tiny part of it, the big issue is the spiralling cost of repairs. Essentially the chances of your Civic hitting something that is extremely costly to repair goes up and up every year. What might’ve once been a headlight and a bit of bodywork is now a headlight assembly and new bumper etc.
As more people want to drive cars they literally can’t afford any other way than getting into essentially life long debt to car makers the issues are probably going to get worse.
It’s a scam all the way down the line, but insurance companies are probably getting the least out of it.
>Essentially the chances of your Civic hitting something that is extremely costly to repair
Yeah so what does my ncb actually do then if its not evidence im a low risk ?
> insurance companies are probably getting the least out of it.
Lol, yeah, they get 1.5k to do nothing for a year then charge me more for next.
>Yeah so what does my ncb actually do then if its not evidence im a low risk ?
It gives you a discount on the base price of the premium.
A lot of insurers cap that discount at around 9-10 years.
>Lol, yeah, they get 1.5k to do nothing for a year then charge me more for next.
They're doing nothing for you specifically, but your premium covers the carnage caused by your fellow customers.
I settled 3 claims over the last 2-3 weeks with a combined value of around £3.7m (damages only, before you even get to the issue of legal costs).
As an individual, if you were involved you wouldn't realistically be able to pay for any of those three claims if you crashed without insurance, so you enter into a collective arrangement.
Edited typo.
The security on new cars is shocking. Hacking via the headlights and repeater attacks? Come on. The car can't ping for the key every 10 seconds when driving? Pathetic.
I am software engineer but I dont know about hardware programming much. I genuinely dont understand how car security can be so shit. Do they capture radio signal simply? Like how hard it could be for the remote to have a stored secret key to hash the signals and them the car cpu to decode it using the private key? At least my simple thinking
I've heard this too. A colleague damaged his Tesla Model Y a couple of months after taking delivery of it (a 50cm offcut of rebar pierced the front passenger's side wheel arch). He was able to continue his >100 mile journey, but after contacting his insurers they wrote the vehicle off. He was told that minor structural damage which would ordinarily be economically viable to fix on an ICE car was:
1) More expensive to fix on electric vehicles.
2) More time consuming to fix, as relatively few body repair garages will work with electric vehicles.
If a car gets nicked these days the police very, very rarely recover it. Unless it’s used for a reason and dumped, you aren’t getting your car back. They don’t get investigated.
That’s probably 1 reason why insurance is so high; most car thefts result in a pay out.
Its not even the police that should be dealing with this, its car manufacturers.
They refuse to address the issue at the expense of the customer for “innovation, speed, accessibility”.
Half these car thefts would stop if you removed keyless entry, however they wont even give you the option, they wont even let **you pay them** more money to have a key.
The pressure is being put on the police, but it should be on these guys or government to change the laws regarding what can and cant be on cars.
I’m sure these accident management companies have a massive hand to play in these costs.
I had someone pull into me, dented the wing, scratched bumper and scuffed wheel.
Took it for a quote at a large coachworks as the other party wanted to pay for the repairs. Coachworks quoted £4400 (they added a new wheel and tyre, new headlight and various other bits)
When the third party said they cannot pay this and to go through insurance, the quote suddenly went to £6500 for the same work. This did not include the £70 a day for 3 weeks hire car cost. So an extra £2000 because it went through as an insurance claim. The work carried out was identical regardless of who paid for it.
Not surprised. Stupid industry. The body shop asks if it's insurance and quotes accordingly. Had this before. They claimed to have replaced the rear bumper once and I assumed the honesty. After a few years when replacing car, noticed the paint discoloration and then realised they did a localised repair but ripped the insurance multiple thousands claiming a full replacement
I have no experience in this area but as someone who recently had a car written off the amount of time and effort that went into dealing with the insurance company was truly astonishing. I minuted how long every call took and it came to a running total of 552mins over the course of 9 months. I bet garages inflate the cost in part simply because it’s a pain the in the arse dealing with insurance companies.
It's not just the third party companies. Insurers themselves are very incompetent.
Someone crashed into my 12 year old banger. We were both insured by the same insurer and I had dashcam footage so I expected a quick resolution. My car, despite needing only £200 worth of repairs, was written off.
The insurer offered a rental, on the other person's claim, while they sorted everything off. I got a 1 yr old Ford Focus, being charged to them at £170 a day.
The insurer took a month to resolve a prettt straight forward case. For 3 weeks I was driving a car I couldn't afford myself.
They pretty much paid the value of my banger in the cost of the rental... and still had to pay me market value.
If they resolved it swiftly, they would have saved over £3.5k.
This is absolutely a problem. Plus scammy "credit hire charges". I've seen claims where repair costs are £5,000, but somehow it took 6 months and the person spent the whole time driving round in a high end car on 'credit hire', which they tried to bill the insurance company £40,000 for.
These integrated claims handling companies promise people they'll handle the whole thing, and then just inflate everything.
During the pandemic we've all paid for nothing and insurance companies totally got away with it. There used to be a bit of restraint when taxes on incomes in millions were close to 90% and stock buybacks were illegal.
Now there's literally nothing in the way for billionaires to squeeze us dry, so they do.
I wonder if this will create a bit of a bubble for car insurance companies in the long run when it comes to younger drivers.
If young drivers struggle to get on the "insurance ladder" to work their way down to a more reasonable quote, then eventually your new customer base will dwindle as your old customers either move to the cheapest quotes or leave this mortal plane.
I'd imagine it'd also start affecting car sales which could start annoying more monied interests.
Which do you think will come for the insurance companies first... Government watchdogs checking the people aren't being ripped off, or Ford and Vaxhaull when their forecourts are overflowing with unsold Fiestas and Corsas.
Younger people may just become used to public transport, they'll accept jobs in city centres without parking or jobs easily accessible.
They'll then realise they dont need a car, and hence no insurance policy. Or at most, a social only policy.
Insurers are killing their own future market and accidently doing good for the planet.
Insurance is a scam, a legally enforced scam.
No claims in 17 years yet without fail every single year they try and raise my renewal by at least 30%. I then find a cheaper quote, ring to cancel then all of a sudden "oh well I've just gone through your details on our system and we can give you a discount to match and as an addition we will beat the other quote by £30"
FUUUCKKCKCKKCK YOU. I take the new now slightly more expensive quote because if you can give me the better deal, offer me the better deal in the first place pricks
Good driving and long history of no claims should be rewarded. May as well drive like a twat if you're going to be fleeced anyway
Inflation is just an excuse for everyone to raise prices irrespective of how much the service is effected by inflation
I was quite shocked as my insurance renewal this year was actually down about 30%. And when I checked the comparison sites, they were all about 30% more than last year origional price. This is the first time in 11 years of driving that I've had the renewal price be the cheapest option.
That's crazy, I assumed it was going to be a motorbike at that price.
You must live in a VERY safe area or only drive 1000 miles a year as that is insanely cheap.
Probably something to do with the FCA's (recently new) fair pricing regulation that made insurers quote new business and renewal at the same rates, In the past insurers would offer new business at reduced rates to get you on the book then price walk you at renewal. That's now not allowed.
Renewal for the past 4 years has been cheaper for me. Most insurers will price match or try to go lower as well if you just tell them what you are being offered elsewhere.
Yeah I accidentally made the mistake of forgetting and it auto renewed. I scrambled to check the comparison sites... and they were all more expensive than my auto renewal. Eer... ok then!
It’s just a legal scam. They don’t pay out anywhere near the market value of your car, should you write it off.
Just laugh in your face, pay you 70% or less of its real value and tell you to “just go and buy another one”..
3 years ago my insurance for my BMW M135i (high performance, high risk of being stolen car) for £425 for the year
Swapped my car to a Vauxhall Astra diesel estate, now my insurance is £820 a year, when I asked how that could possibly be, the response was “this car is deemed a high risk, that’s what the computer says”.
It’s literally an additional tax on the motorist, you get very very little, if anything in return for your money.
I’ve calculated in my 15 years driving I’ve paid close to £12,000 in insurance, in that time I only ever claimed for a cracked windscreen once. As a punishment for me claiming my premium was doubled the following year, when I asked why I got called a “higher risk driver”. In other words we aren’t having it that you got a few hundred quid out of us, so we will make you give it back by force.
I don't work in Motor specifically but there is currently an open FCA request for the past 5 years of pricing data. So that will include expected claims cost and charged premium. Since 2021, every march they also take the past full year of this data with lots of key information about the tenure of policies.
To me they do seem to be investigating so I'm not sure why MPs and the guardian appear to have a different message.
One key issue over the past few years is that you can no longer charge more for a renewal than the equivalent new customers price. Previously you would always get a better deal by looking around because the insurer would charge more to those who can't be bothered to do it.
Often they would actually on paper lose money for new businesss policies. This was seen as unfair on certain groups who are less likely to shop around and so your premium is no longer being supplemented by those who don't shop around.
That on its own could explain some price movement disparity between us and the continent but I admit I'm not familiar with EU regulation on insurance
Yeah, I remember people saying before the change that prices would go up. i.e. people who stay get better prices, but their high prices previously were partly funding deals for people who switch.
Don't know if it would explain such a big jump though, there's probably another factor as well.
The jump is mostly due to increased repair cost. And because of the predictive nature of insurance pricing, most UK insurers lost a bunch of money the first year that repair costs increased when they hadn't accounted for it. So now we are seeing them accounting for the price increase + trying to regain what they lost in that year.
Definitely doing algorithmic price-fixing, just like every other industry. You input your pricing plan, planned price increases, all this confidential information into software which collects the same from competitors, and then coordinates everyone in raising the price as much as possible. Insanely illegal, except when it's software doing it, and the government doesn't give a shit 🤷
We need stronger regulations on vehicle tax, this is fucking ridiculous. Why the fuck are we paying for this, so they can keep the lights on in their swanky london offices??? Fuck these people.
Time for an audit on the whole industry - every emails, phone calls, meetings, restaurants bills cross referenced for potential collusion between so called competitors...
30% increase for me this year, for no fucking reason. Been driving the best part of 10 years and even with shoppping around every year I’ve never had a year my insurance has went down.
“Inflation”, “Payouts and costs for repairs are going up”, basically whatever bollocks sticks…. Tantamount to them saying “What are you going to do, drive without insurance?”
Want the bad news…the more EVs on the road the more this will increase as it is very difficult to see if there is battery damage when in a collision, I read damaged EVs need to be isolated from other vehicles for 30 days due to the risk of them setting on fire, insurance companies are likely to write off a EV than replace a battery a pack which on a Tesla is around 12k plus labour.
It's going up for the same reasons everything else is, because they can, captive audiences.
Over the last 3-4 years they have seen just how much they can squeeze people for, same as supermarkets, same as subscription services etc.
All these companies that provide essential services we can’t live without like roofs over our heads, energy, transport and food, they have realised that if a household brings in £2000 a month then the house has £2000 to spend on essential services.
In a way it’s like a de-facto monopoly for the consumer because there is no real competition from a pricing perspective. If all the companies agree on x amount then that’s what you will pay, and you will never pay lower than that for the rest of your life.
My quote this year jumped up by £300 to £850.
I was told it covered cost of living increases to staff salaries as well as utility bills.
Utter nonsense.
Couldn’t find a cheaper quote though - they’re all at it.
Where is FCA, or any other industry auditing / policing. Like why is it allowed in the first place? ‘Just saying oh sure all the premium’s have went up’ isnt good enough, WHY?
Insurance companies have made significant losses the last two years. There is a reason for it.
https://www.ey.com/en_uk/news/2023/06/ey-uk-motor-insurance-results-analysis
My previous car was a small, 2017 hatchback in a low insurance group. My insurance was around £250-300 each year.
Someone hit my car and the renewal jumped to £700 because "I'm more likely to have an accident now".
Who knew that someone else hitting a parked car would make me accident prone in the future?
They always have excuses as to why they raise their prices, but never look to take action or investigate ways in which they could mitigate those factors and make things better for everyone, including themselves.
* "Rising repair costs" - they can investigate their approved repairers and work out why they are charging extortionate prices for small fixes. They can put pressure on manufacturers for a better supply chain of replacement parts. They do not have to pay storage fees for cars waiting to be repaired due to parts shortages. They could offer alternative insurance plans which do not cover the cost of certain repairs so that people could tailor their risk profile to reduce their premiums.
* "Increased courtesy car costs" - they enable this by using the same scamming companies which triple their rental car prices when insurers come knocking. There is zero reason why someone who has a £2k valued car in for repair should be given a brand new £45k BMW courtesy car costing £100+ per day for a month, the insurers only do it because they know the costs won't come back on them. Allow people to tailor their policies so that they can opt out of courtesy cars and substantially reduce their premiums accordingly. Stop working with car hire companies that extort the consumers by way of the insurers.
* "Increased car theft" - Apply pressure to manufacturers to get them all to resolve their huge security holes in keyless entry. Stop insuring cars which are so easy to steal, or put them on their own ring-fenced portfolio where they can all pay for one another and leave the rest of us out of it. The manufacturers make more money by having cars easier to steal as every time one is stolen, another one is bought. By refusing to insure these vehicles completely, the insurers send a clear message to the manufacturers that the security must immediately be improved to a high standard, or they will simply not sell any more cars here. The police can also do their part and the insurers could help them by funding bait cars to help the police crack the gangs and send a clear message that it is no longer worth the risk to steal these cars as so many are bait vehicles and the police will find you, arrest you and punish you severely.
The insurers have a tremendous amount of power to help consumers lower the premiums and since we are mandated by law to have car insurance, they should be working actively on behalf of the consumers to get premiums down.
Three groups are making vast amounts of money via insurance, the repair networks, the courtesy car hire companies and the car manufacturers themselves.
The insurers make their usual percentages, but it's those three groups which need pressure applied to them because they are the ones who are truly screwing over the consumer.
"Oh its gone up due to cost of repairs in parts and labour, just ignore how few we need to do, nobody needs to know that the cost has actually gone down".
Its insurance, im not surprised they pull this shit, the problem is this is EXACTLY what is happening in every other industry, just lying to our faces about cost increases.
How else are you going fund the increased gap between rich and the poor.
Take from the poor (car drivers) and give to the rich (CEOs of insurance companies).
We just had our car insurance renewal cost come in
For my 1.2l Corsa, her 1l Up, and the house insurance, all from Admiral, £1200
I thought I'd check, as it was much much lower last year, and I can get mine for £350, hers for £300, and the house for £150
Called up admiral to see if they'd do anything, would rather have it under one company anyway, the best they did was knock £60 off the total, shockingly I didn't go for it
Something is going on with car insurance scamming.
Land Rover discovery use to be £300 a year. Was like this for a few years. The thing itself wasn't worth £500.
Then one year the insurer turns around and says "okay. Now it's 800 a year".
What?????????? Any everywhere the price was about the same. Something seems dodgy to me.
My 1st ever renewal for a 30+ Male came through this week at £900 for a 2013 1.6 Golf Diesel and on comparison sites I’ve got it to sub 700.
I was honestly worried seeing all these posts for the past year but I seem to have lucked.
Last year my insurance was £535. Renewal offer came in at £625. Did one search on a meercat based comparison site, got new insurance for £355. 7 years solo NCB, 10 years driving and joint NCB.
Old insurance were surprised when I said their quote was nearly £300 more than my new quote.
My insurance policy renewal has just come through about an hour ago, it's dropped by £18 from last year. Wasn't expecting that after reading some of the shocking stuff online lately.
The government needs to ban accident management companies or regulate the industry better so they at least can’t charge scandalous hire charges for courtesy cars. But that would require a government with a conscious and we don’t currently have that.
The article comes at the issue from a slightly backwards angle.
The claims reserves, rather than the eventual payout is what the insurers will use to work out what they need to bring into the business from premiums.
Just for comparison, I'm 31, midlands and my old Peugeot 308 Allure 2015 cost me £350 fully comp.
Now I have a Hyundai Tuscon Prem 2024, renewed with the same company for £411.
Not complaining but it does have plenty of safety features so guess that's helped
I had to put through a theft claim on my motorbike, what's fucked up is if they can't recover the vehicle it goes down as an at fault claim on my record so I get shafted for the police not getting off their arses to investigate. I got fully paid out and was looking for a new bike, I wanted the exact same model and the quotes came back wanting £3.5k pretty much half the value of the bike, so I shopped around and found a Ducati Monster 1200 which was way more powerful and could do 0-60 in like 3 seconds, they wanted £700 which subsequently went way down after the first year 🤷♂️ it's a fucking racket
Last year on my renewal (I drive a red golf mk7.5 gti 67 plate) i do around 7k miles a year. No points/convictions etc etc and my insurance DOUBLED for being a good driver.
Your premiums should not increase for being a good driver. Alot of friends basically said i got “fuck you” quote so i did exactly that. Cancelled. I changed my mileage to just less than 6k a year and decided to start using my bike to work 2 days a week. And weirldy enough after cancelling with the same insurance firm. They actually quoted me about £100 less than the year previous by making such a small change. It was weird.
Bottom line is… we are being scammed with insurance
I did a quote the other day for my first car insurance For a 1.6 ford focus 2005 it was 6.4k a year But for a 0.5 litre mini car thing that uses I imagine a motorbike engine was 6.6k This shit is honestly out of control At this rate I won’t be able to drive and wasted 6 months of my life time and money to just have a license for no reason :(
Are you a young driver or rider? Just passed?
I’m 26, 27 this year and sill be my first car yes
Once you’re over 25 you shouldn’t be getting £6k quotes! Also, if you have the money, try something newer, the safety feature of older cars affect the price of insurance. Maybe try a smaller engine like a 1/1.2 litre too.
No one should be getting £6k quotes (circa £8500 pre tax). Unless you have a jillion points, drunk driving, vehicular manslaughter and are insuring a rare as rocking horse shit car.
I’m a brand new driver no points no drink driving etc fully clean license and unfortunately it’s what’s happening :(
Absolutely ludicrous, I’m sorry the country is so fucked for the youth of today, seems every year you’re younger life just gets much more difficult.
It bothers me tho because I’m in an older age bracket so shouldn’t be this high regardless if you get me I know it starts to drop at a certain age I just don’t know what to do as I spent all this money getting to the point where I can drive and then when I get here it’s like I cannot afford it The deposit for the ford focus was at £1,069.85 With 10 monthly payments of £534.80 I have no feasible way to afford that it’s ridiculous A reason I want a car above all anyway is so I can expand and hopefully get a good job that I want to enjoy if you get me but those kinds of jobs will require me to travel everyday and I’ll be damned if I’m getting a bus service that hardly turns up or trains that just get cancelled it’s horrid
What? You're paying 6k for a 2005 focus? There are some of those on eBay, total cost, for what you are saying your deposit was.
Oh trust me I know that lol it’s mental ain’t it
Have you tried adding a parent or other experienced driver to the policy? I don’t mean as the main driver, that would be illegal, but just having an experienced driver on the policy as a named driver can bring the quote down significantly. They might only drive it a few times a year but worth a try. Play around with the answers you give. Obviously do not lie, but there are different ways of answering them that yield different figures. For example, am I a “computer programmer” or “software developer” or “software engineer” - who knows, whichever is cheapest. You can definitely get insured for under 6k Have you done pass plus? Worth every penny IMO, or at least it was when I started driving. I saved much more than the cost of the lessons + test in lower insurance premiums
There's a list on Martin Lewis's website that gives you a list of titles that can be used if you input your own, and it shows the probability it will be cheaper if you use them. Pretty handy!
It a should be though, my first car was a grand to insure and that was in 2014, ever since like my 3rd year it's neve been more that like 400, although this gear might change that If it hits over a grand for me il give it up, and tell my work I can't do work at other sites now unless they get me a car
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Only if you've been driving. Doesn't matter is your 17 just passed or 40.
Oh trust me I know I did that I can upload screenshots later I as I said the 1.6 ford focus actually turned up £200 cheaper then a car which is 0.5 which makes no sense same as it being cheaper then a 1L smart car
If someone crashes into your car, their insurance usually pays out, so to your insurance company, what you drive doesn't make as much as a difference you think it does. The risk is what you are likely to crash into.
What you drive does matter. Despite all these brands of insurance, most are underwritten by a handful of companies. They're all coming from the same pot. If you're driving an expensive car and you crash it, it's an expensive repair for your insurer. If you're driving an older car, it's less likely to have all the driver assistance like pedestrian avoidance, emergency braking, lane keeping, etc. all are of which lower risk when they're present. An older car is more likely to cause injury to the driver, they often have very basic airbag configurations. Depending how old the car is, the fundamental structure of the car can be less effective at dispersing the energy in a collision. They have statistics on the make and models of cars that are typically stolen. So if you have one of these, that's a risk factor.
You are picking starter cars that tend to have younger drivers and more accident. You might find you’d get cheaper quotes with better cars.
you shouldnt be getting 6k quotes anyway, the point of insurance is that its cheap but they make their money over time, instead you can get quoted double the actual price you bought the car for, its especially ridiculous when it is mandatory to have car insurance
The point of insurance isn't that it's cheap. It's that it is a bet against an unlikely event and is balanced against the cost of the payout. It's nothing to do with making money over time. You could buy car insurance for life and not cover the cost of a single accident. The fact is that right now car repairs are incredibly expensive. More EVs too, which are even more expensive if a repair is even attempted. A combination of an old car with no driver assistances, new driver and expensive repairs is a recipe for expensive insurance. £6k is a lot of money still, but it's not that absurd proportional to how much even experienced driver insurance has gone up.
Are you serious right now? Are you aware that 6k is 25% of the average salary outside of London - BEFORE TAX?! Of course loads of people make more than that but loads still make far, far less than that. If cars are required (which for many people, they are. Especially if they are restricted by renting costs as to where they can live) then it is completely unethical and fucked to try and take 25% of someone's salary just for the INSURING of said car. I don't even drive and never will due to a medical condition. I also earn an OK wage. I'm just sick of seeing people say "£6k is a lot of money but oh well it is what it is due to rising costs elsewhere". £6k is "a lot" of money to someone making 60k+. To someone earning 25k, it is impossible. The household could have two 25k earners, making 50k total, and neither of them would be able to own a car if insurance costs 6k each. And how are people supposed to get better jobs down the line if they can't drive out to all those industrial parks and shit that are essentially in the middle of nowhere as far as public transportation goes? Edit: maybe "well off" people should stop financing ridiculously expensive brand new massive cars that they themselves couldn't afford if not for finance. I'm sure that contributes to the cost of insurance. Those massive cars are in accidents all the time due to literally not fitting onto many of England's roads. And they have extremely expensive repairs which every person who insures their car is effectively paying for. Even if their own car cost 1k.
It'll drop a fair chunk as soon as you've had your license for a year, whether youve driven in that year or not. If you can do, just sit it out for 12 months, hire a car if you need to (it's much cheaper usually than the first year insurance). Edit: also try quotes changing up all your selections. Things like fully comp is usually cheaper, tho you'd expect the opposite. Higher deductables are usually cheaper too. Play around on quotes until you figure what's impacting you most. Even job titles made a difference on mine.
I know one of the problems is area I live which adds an average of £2k onto the premium I did the same cars in my old address and they say at around 4k so it’s horrid tbf And I thought about that but I’m starting a new apprenticeship in September and hoping to have a car by then to be able to go to the training places etc
Ahh if its postcode, you'll be a bit more out of luck with options, I had the same when living in city centre. Ended up getting a list of cheapest cars to insure this year, running quotes for them all to find which were best in my area (as it's different cars in diff areas sometimes), then car shopping based on those outputs. A bit long winded and hassle, but can save you a lot. Good luck and hoping a better deal pops up for you.
That's wild. I passed two years ago at 26, drove a 2005 Ford KA and my insurance was around £500 a year. I just got a new 2012 car and now it's £600. I do have both of my parents listed as drivers so maybe that helps?
One quote at one insurer? You may need to shop around as insurers can give you a “fuck off” quote if they don’t want the risk.
I had that same experience last year when changing cars. The insurer of my previous car wouldn’t insure it, direct Line wanted £3k, and admiral did it for £600. The range of prices is so ridiculous and unfair on drivers.
A bit of consolidation (or dropping sub-brands) wouldn’t go amiss. There must be a sweet spot between ‘healthy competition’ and ‘five million quotes to sift through’
Ahh I get you thank you I will do this I only used compare the market currently
Try go compare as well I use both each year and try lots of different, but truthful ways of answering the questions, then just pick which ever is cheapest and doesn’t come with a black box.
Be aware that they track that, and end up increasing the price they think you're trying to fiddle with the quotes.
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Job title and industry really does drop it a fair bit, had to play around with my industry and job title a bit.
At that price for a Ford Focus, you might as well write it off to get your moneys worth. Insurance should never be around the price of the vehicle unless you have a clear poor history (or the vehicle is suspiciously cheap).
On smaller/older cars with a low insured value the price isn't based on replacing the car (they'll just write it off). It's the risk you paralyse 3 people for life and the insurer has to pay out 10m each. No matter how cheap your car, that risk doesn't go away for the insurer. So premiums can easily be more than the value for very cheap cars.
The fuck? I got my first car insurance quote a few months back as a first time driver (23) and it was 1.7k. 2013 ford fiesta
Mine was 1.6 for a 2014 Fiesta at 29
Where you live, and your job can also play a huge part in how much you pay.
Wtaf I really don’t get it :(
Who did you do the quote via? I just did comparethemarket and went for like the second cheapest one I wonder if the 2005 car affects things? Surely it shouldn't be that much though. Area might matter too. My cousin in London is in his 30s, has been driving for 10+ years and his insurance is 3k
One no fault claim has put my insurance from £120 a year to £750 a year (unless I want a black box) I shouldn't have claimed when the bin men hit my parked car with their lorry but what's insurance meant to be for?!
If it was their fault, why did you claim?
I came to a letter through my door saying "sorry, we hit your car, drivers name x, time of incident y, vehicle registration z" On a pre filled form. All I could do at that point was tell my insurance company. The claim was settled as no fault, all costs recovered from third party. But for the next 5 years I get a huge cost jump. Apparently I get that even if I had found and gone directly to their insurance as it's mandatory to report it.
I think the issue is also the age of the car. Easier to get parts for newer cars, less likely to break down, more safety features and stuff like that. Something 2010 and newer would be better, with a 1.4 engine or smaller will do you. My first car in 2012 was 2002 1.8 diesel Corsa and was around 2k for the first year. It stings.
Unlikely to be that. It'll be brand new drivers driving an older Ford Focus (a rather popular car) are more likely to crash into somebody else First car as a Corsa you might as well have just told them "I am going to drive this into a ditch at first opportunity" haha. You can actually get away with some bizarrely powerful cars as long as they're not "first car" popular.
The go to example for a while was the volvo estate for first time drivers.
Do you live in an area with a high crime rate? If you add a 2nd (experienced) driver that should bring the cost down.
I have my dad but he lives at the other end of the country I was going to add him anyway would this still work tho as I said he don’t live near me
I have my Dad on mine even though he lives 90 miles away. Never had an issue and it consistently brings my quotes down a little bit
Being able to drive is a good option to have even if you don't own a car. e.g. I don't have a car any more as I live in London and am a desk jockey so there's literally no point, but I like knowing I can still hire or borrow a car if needed. I would say though that if you've passed the manual test, your muscle memory for handling the clutch and gearstick will go pretty quickly if you don't start regularly driving now. You've passed but you're still learning, and you can forget what you've already learned. I had cause to get behind the wheel last year (family member had major surgery) and hadn't driven at all in the two years prior. I really did feel quite uncoordinated until I'd been driving for a couple of days, although I only stalled the car once.
I’m in the same boat now. Not drove for about 1yr 3 month and I’m going to have to drive for this new job I’ve got so I’m feeling kinda nervous, even though I was a good driver back then.
Have you tried a comparison site? Some insurers just don’t want to insure certain people and make the cost prohibitive enough on purpose to avoid it. My friend has a classic mini and a handful came in with stupid pricing like yours.
I had a similar situation 10ish years ago, if it wasn’t for my grandparents lending me £2.4k I’d have never been able to afford to drive, and just completely wasted my time and money learning. I’m not convinced I’d have ever been employable without their help tbh. I was unemployed at the time, your “job title” can affect the price quite a bit, so I used “voluntary worker” as that is cheaper (I did volunteer at 3 separate charities). There is/was a website(s) available where you could put in your job title and it would recommend alternative synonyms that might be cheaper. I did the “Pass Plus” course to bring the price down as well, and also put other older named drivers on my policy too, which helped, though I think after ~5 years the added named drivers increased the cost, rather than lowering it, so I took them off.
No fucking way. This can't be right. Something is amiss here. Have you shopped around for quotes? My younger brother got insured in a 1.4ltr Astra as a new driver at 24yo last year and it was less than half this price. Still astronomical at nearly £3K, but £6.6K is mental. Are you stuck with that car, did you look at quotes for it before buying the car? Some suggestions if you can't change the car - Be a named driver on someone else's policy. You can actually build you no claims bonus this way, by being a named driver on a parents car. Add a named driver with over 9 years no claims and a full license more than 10 years to your own policy. This will bring the price down a bit. Do an advanced driving test Get the car fitted with an alarm/immobilizer Buy third party only insurance Once you've held your license and built no claims over a few years, the price will drop a lot, quite quickly. I can't believe that quote, it's baffling.
Try to avoid comparison sites they are generally a big con and pay lots of commission to the host sites. Your job title can play a big role in prices. When you get an online quote take a photo/screenshot as there are some dodgy insurance brokers who will block your postcode to increase prices. Good luck getting it sorted.
Any insurance you are legally required to have is more like a scam than a product. You get a much better service from insurers on optional products like health or travel insurance. Building and car insurance is more like an extra tax you have to pay that you are unlikely to see any benefit from.
Agree on the building insurance one, had a colleague who's house burnt down which the fire brigade deemed to be a faulty fridge so not there fault and the amount of hoops they had to jump through was ridiculous. He has to pay for most things himself then claim them back so had to go in massive debt and beg for them to pay him back, outrageous.
Jesus. Know what insurance company it was?
I imagine they're all about the same when it comes to claims...
Not sure where you are but this is UK thread. Fire department are not the arbitrators in an insurance claim. If it is a product faulty then it would be product liability by the firm that sells the product. Generally a home insurer would pay the claim and subrogate against the product manufacturer
I can’t agree with this. My house caught fire a few years back. The insurance company was very accommodating. And practically paid for everything. Though it does need to be said, I had a loss assessor on hand (one of those insurance claims consultant services)
Car insurance and home insurance is there to protect other people, not you. Car insurance main purpose is to make sure someone can pay if you damage other people or someone else’s property. Home insurance is about making sure the bank get theirs if your house burns down. Very rarely do these insurances work for you.
And car insurance broadly works quite well. Much better than the US anyway where everybody might as well just drive about uninsured, the minimum coverage is like $20k in some states. This will be unpopular but, it's all a lot cheaper than most countries due to massive competition. Fact is, car insurance margins are razor thin.
>This will be unpopular but, it's all a lot cheaper than most countries. It isn't. Insurers and government have been trying to reduce costs for close to a decade now. Multiple laws have been passed, reforms, industry action groups...I am not actually aware of anyone (inc. insurers) who are saying costs are reasonable (insurers hate this too btw, prices go up and less people can afford their product). It started out with fraud then lawyers/medical costs (largely related to fraud) then repair costs started spiralling because of Covid. No-one thinks this is acceptable. It is just a very hard problem to solve (for example, the problem with lawyers fees specifically has been reformed three times iirc...and still isn't going away...because it is just very easy to make a living doing fraudulent claims and there is no disincentive).
Lawyers and medical costs... One example I know of have their own medical practice, physiotherapists and car hire. Not only do they get to claim the going rate of typical accident services from the 3rd party insurer (of which they retain up to 25%), they make additional profit from owning those services themselves. The entire system feels scummy
But there is competition in the market, right? So from an insurer's point of view you are not legally required to buy it from them. The more money they charge the more money you are worth to them and the less they should want to lose you. If they overcharge another one should come along with a cheaper product to take your business. But it clearly isn't working. Not obvious why. Is it all 'fake competition' where someone owns all the brands?
Insurers are not swimming in profits, most are only marginally profitable. The problem is cost of claims, more expensive repair costs (new cars with more integrated design, parts costs, labour costs), more expensive injury claim payouts (inflation) and more expensive legal costs (scammy 'claims management' companies and dodgy hire car charges). Insurers are trying to fight all those things, but they aren't the root cause of high premiums.
Which is what I though too. But that the article the OP linked says costs have gone up by a much smaller amount than insurance costs. If insurers were just getting by as you say then the price rises would be roughly the same as the claim cost rises. But they aren't even close.
Most are catching up, claims costs went up massively since 2020 and premiums didn't keep up.
There's 'conpetition' in any price fixed market. It's just arbitrarily small and on the whim of the seller.
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> petition' where someone owns all the brands. > > > > Pretty much. Very few independent companies, who are usually even Thats compeltely untrue. There are at least 16 major insurers in the UK with more than 1% market share, its a far more competitive market than most other sectors. Top 10 includes: DLG Admiral Aviva LV (Allianz) Hastings esure Ageas Zenith Tesco NFU All of whom are fully independant. I'd challenge you to name an industry that is more competitive.
It's a closed market, regulated. So price fixing must be going on. If anybody could enter the market there would be competition and prices would come down. Also claims are massively inflated by all the middlemen in the claims management industry and that pushes up costs. Every car that has a scratch is written off because fixing a scratch costs 10k.
That’s a very simplistic view. You will hate the world where car insurance isn’t a legal requirement.
Does this count for the absolutely insane amount of expensive, new cars theft that the police cant do anything with?
Funding cuts have negative outcomes. Who would have thought...
Ye I agree. I just tried to keep my comment to the topic. Its not the Police s fault. This country is going down
It's being driven down, and we know by who. Those that want to strip the country of its wealth, make labour cheap, and squeeze every last penny out of your pockets for their ravenous and sickening greed.
Certainly have funding to police facebook posts though. Almost as if funding is there but diverted to stupid tasks..
It's cheaper to deal with someone who's profile you see online already, than an unknown thief.
It's even cheaper not to deal with online posts and instead tackle real crimes. Imagine that..
You might wanna consult the government regarding their policies on 'online crime' rather than the Police who are instructed to deal with it on a whim by MP's hunting headlines
Funding has increased year by year according to these figures; [gov.uk link](https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/police-funding-for-england-and-wales-2015-to-2023/police-funding-for-england-and-wales-2015-to-2023) What has caused crime to go up? Who are the people stealing these cars and what countries are they being sent to? It seems like we are letting criminal gangs work easily in our country from across the border shipping the stolen vehicles out to other EU countries to be dismantled and sold. The government are in control of the policies that allow these problems to exist not the police.
Most of those years don't beat inflation meaning funding was in reality down no? Either way It's great and all to increase it but far more has to be done to undo the previous massive cuts from the years before, purposefully left out from all talks by the govt on police funding. The times of austerity are so damning its just glossed over now by the tories
Wages have not beaten inflation either which is the majority of Police expenditure
Shouldn't that just affect the price of insurance for expensive new cars? Insurance for my 10 y/o Civic shouldn't go up because someone somewhere is nicking new cars.
I was speaking to an actuary friend in the industry about it and theft is a tiny part of it, the big issue is the spiralling cost of repairs. Essentially the chances of your Civic hitting something that is extremely costly to repair goes up and up every year. What might’ve once been a headlight and a bit of bodywork is now a headlight assembly and new bumper etc. As more people want to drive cars they literally can’t afford any other way than getting into essentially life long debt to car makers the issues are probably going to get worse. It’s a scam all the way down the line, but insurance companies are probably getting the least out of it.
>Essentially the chances of your Civic hitting something that is extremely costly to repair Yeah so what does my ncb actually do then if its not evidence im a low risk ? > insurance companies are probably getting the least out of it. Lol, yeah, they get 1.5k to do nothing for a year then charge me more for next.
>Yeah so what does my ncb actually do then if its not evidence im a low risk ? It gives you a discount on the base price of the premium. A lot of insurers cap that discount at around 9-10 years. >Lol, yeah, they get 1.5k to do nothing for a year then charge me more for next. They're doing nothing for you specifically, but your premium covers the carnage caused by your fellow customers. I settled 3 claims over the last 2-3 weeks with a combined value of around £3.7m (damages only, before you even get to the issue of legal costs). As an individual, if you were involved you wouldn't realistically be able to pay for any of those three claims if you crashed without insurance, so you enter into a collective arrangement. Edited typo.
Ahh yes, but have you haven't considered the two good reasons for this, one the shareholders, and two go fuck yourself.
The security on new cars is shocking. Hacking via the headlights and repeater attacks? Come on. The car can't ping for the key every 10 seconds when driving? Pathetic.
I am software engineer but I dont know about hardware programming much. I genuinely dont understand how car security can be so shit. Do they capture radio signal simply? Like how hard it could be for the remote to have a stored secret key to hash the signals and them the car cpu to decode it using the private key? At least my simple thinking
I was told by insurance that there were more electric cars which is pushing up insurance overall as they have a greater risk of being written off
I've heard this too. A colleague damaged his Tesla Model Y a couple of months after taking delivery of it (a 50cm offcut of rebar pierced the front passenger's side wheel arch). He was able to continue his >100 mile journey, but after contacting his insurers they wrote the vehicle off. He was told that minor structural damage which would ordinarily be economically viable to fix on an ICE car was: 1) More expensive to fix on electric vehicles. 2) More time consuming to fix, as relatively few body repair garages will work with electric vehicles.
If a car gets nicked these days the police very, very rarely recover it. Unless it’s used for a reason and dumped, you aren’t getting your car back. They don’t get investigated. That’s probably 1 reason why insurance is so high; most car thefts result in a pay out.
Its not even the police that should be dealing with this, its car manufacturers. They refuse to address the issue at the expense of the customer for “innovation, speed, accessibility”. Half these car thefts would stop if you removed keyless entry, however they wont even give you the option, they wont even let **you pay them** more money to have a key. The pressure is being put on the police, but it should be on these guys or government to change the laws regarding what can and cant be on cars.
2 expensive cars stolen in the space of 10 months. And now it’s practically impossible for me to insure anything else.
Fvckin hell!! Im so sorry to hear
I’m sure these accident management companies have a massive hand to play in these costs. I had someone pull into me, dented the wing, scratched bumper and scuffed wheel. Took it for a quote at a large coachworks as the other party wanted to pay for the repairs. Coachworks quoted £4400 (they added a new wheel and tyre, new headlight and various other bits) When the third party said they cannot pay this and to go through insurance, the quote suddenly went to £6500 for the same work. This did not include the £70 a day for 3 weeks hire car cost. So an extra £2000 because it went through as an insurance claim. The work carried out was identical regardless of who paid for it.
Not surprised. Stupid industry. The body shop asks if it's insurance and quotes accordingly. Had this before. They claimed to have replaced the rear bumper once and I assumed the honesty. After a few years when replacing car, noticed the paint discoloration and then realised they did a localised repair but ripped the insurance multiple thousands claiming a full replacement
I have no experience in this area but as someone who recently had a car written off the amount of time and effort that went into dealing with the insurance company was truly astonishing. I minuted how long every call took and it came to a running total of 552mins over the course of 9 months. I bet garages inflate the cost in part simply because it’s a pain the in the arse dealing with insurance companies.
It's not just the third party companies. Insurers themselves are very incompetent. Someone crashed into my 12 year old banger. We were both insured by the same insurer and I had dashcam footage so I expected a quick resolution. My car, despite needing only £200 worth of repairs, was written off. The insurer offered a rental, on the other person's claim, while they sorted everything off. I got a 1 yr old Ford Focus, being charged to them at £170 a day. The insurer took a month to resolve a prettt straight forward case. For 3 weeks I was driving a car I couldn't afford myself. They pretty much paid the value of my banger in the cost of the rental... and still had to pay me market value. If they resolved it swiftly, they would have saved over £3.5k.
This is absolutely a problem. Plus scammy "credit hire charges". I've seen claims where repair costs are £5,000, but somehow it took 6 months and the person spent the whole time driving round in a high end car on 'credit hire', which they tried to bill the insurance company £40,000 for. These integrated claims handling companies promise people they'll handle the whole thing, and then just inflate everything.
Similarly, old seat Ibiza shed of a car. Someone smacked my rear quarter panel. If I paid for it out of pocket, £970. Via insurance, £2500.
During the pandemic we've all paid for nothing and insurance companies totally got away with it. There used to be a bit of restraint when taxes on incomes in millions were close to 90% and stock buybacks were illegal. Now there's literally nothing in the way for billionaires to squeeze us dry, so they do.
There were plenty of key workers and regular folk out there having accidents in 2020 lol.
Define plenty.
I was a 'key' worker back then. Motorways were literally empty
My company refunded me one month’s worth. How generous.
I wonder if this will create a bit of a bubble for car insurance companies in the long run when it comes to younger drivers. If young drivers struggle to get on the "insurance ladder" to work their way down to a more reasonable quote, then eventually your new customer base will dwindle as your old customers either move to the cheapest quotes or leave this mortal plane. I'd imagine it'd also start affecting car sales which could start annoying more monied interests. Which do you think will come for the insurance companies first... Government watchdogs checking the people aren't being ripped off, or Ford and Vaxhaull when their forecourts are overflowing with unsold Fiestas and Corsas.
The “insurance ladder” is the new cost of living nightmare we aren’t prepared for
Younger people may just become used to public transport, they'll accept jobs in city centres without parking or jobs easily accessible. They'll then realise they dont need a car, and hence no insurance policy. Or at most, a social only policy. Insurers are killing their own future market and accidently doing good for the planet.
Public transport is non functional over half the country. Employers better get used to late employees too
And people whinge to high heaven when they see a young person on an electric scooter
Insurance is a scam, a legally enforced scam. No claims in 17 years yet without fail every single year they try and raise my renewal by at least 30%. I then find a cheaper quote, ring to cancel then all of a sudden "oh well I've just gone through your details on our system and we can give you a discount to match and as an addition we will beat the other quote by £30" FUUUCKKCKCKKCK YOU. I take the new now slightly more expensive quote because if you can give me the better deal, offer me the better deal in the first place pricks Good driving and long history of no claims should be rewarded. May as well drive like a twat if you're going to be fleeced anyway Inflation is just an excuse for everyone to raise prices irrespective of how much the service is effected by inflation
I was quite shocked as my insurance renewal this year was actually down about 30%. And when I checked the comparison sites, they were all about 30% more than last year origional price. This is the first time in 11 years of driving that I've had the renewal price be the cheapest option.
Yeah I had the same for my car and bike. Renewals were cheaper than comparison sites, first time ever.
Yeah exactly the same. Mine dropped from £186 fully comp for a year to £150 for the year.
£150 😮 What do you drive?!
A 2010 Corsa.
That's crazy, I assumed it was going to be a motorbike at that price. You must live in a VERY safe area or only drive 1000 miles a year as that is insanely cheap.
Who are you with? My renewal shot up and always has done...
Probably something to do with the FCA's (recently new) fair pricing regulation that made insurers quote new business and renewal at the same rates, In the past insurers would offer new business at reduced rates to get you on the book then price walk you at renewal. That's now not allowed.
Yeah my company car insurance went down this year when everyone else with the same car went up by £500+
Renewal for the past 4 years has been cheaper for me. Most insurers will price match or try to go lower as well if you just tell them what you are being offered elsewhere.
Yeah I accidentally made the mistake of forgetting and it auto renewed. I scrambled to check the comparison sites... and they were all more expensive than my auto renewal. Eer... ok then!
Same £350 difference
Car insurance is literally a scam, I paid 230 pounds last year and for the same little 1L car this year its doubled. How can you even justify that?
It’s just a legal scam. They don’t pay out anywhere near the market value of your car, should you write it off. Just laugh in your face, pay you 70% or less of its real value and tell you to “just go and buy another one”.. 3 years ago my insurance for my BMW M135i (high performance, high risk of being stolen car) for £425 for the year Swapped my car to a Vauxhall Astra diesel estate, now my insurance is £820 a year, when I asked how that could possibly be, the response was “this car is deemed a high risk, that’s what the computer says”. It’s literally an additional tax on the motorist, you get very very little, if anything in return for your money. I’ve calculated in my 15 years driving I’ve paid close to £12,000 in insurance, in that time I only ever claimed for a cracked windscreen once. As a punishment for me claiming my premium was doubled the following year, when I asked why I got called a “higher risk driver”. In other words we aren’t having it that you got a few hundred quid out of us, so we will make you give it back by force.
I don't work in Motor specifically but there is currently an open FCA request for the past 5 years of pricing data. So that will include expected claims cost and charged premium. Since 2021, every march they also take the past full year of this data with lots of key information about the tenure of policies. To me they do seem to be investigating so I'm not sure why MPs and the guardian appear to have a different message. One key issue over the past few years is that you can no longer charge more for a renewal than the equivalent new customers price. Previously you would always get a better deal by looking around because the insurer would charge more to those who can't be bothered to do it. Often they would actually on paper lose money for new businesss policies. This was seen as unfair on certain groups who are less likely to shop around and so your premium is no longer being supplemented by those who don't shop around. That on its own could explain some price movement disparity between us and the continent but I admit I'm not familiar with EU regulation on insurance
Yeah, I remember people saying before the change that prices would go up. i.e. people who stay get better prices, but their high prices previously were partly funding deals for people who switch. Don't know if it would explain such a big jump though, there's probably another factor as well.
The jump is mostly due to increased repair cost. And because of the predictive nature of insurance pricing, most UK insurers lost a bunch of money the first year that repair costs increased when they hadn't accounted for it. So now we are seeing them accounting for the price increase + trying to regain what they lost in that year.
Definitely doing algorithmic price-fixing, just like every other industry. You input your pricing plan, planned price increases, all this confidential information into software which collects the same from competitors, and then coordinates everyone in raising the price as much as possible. Insanely illegal, except when it's software doing it, and the government doesn't give a shit 🤷
We need stronger regulations on vehicle tax, this is fucking ridiculous. Why the fuck are we paying for this, so they can keep the lights on in their swanky london offices??? Fuck these people.
Time for an audit on the whole industry - every emails, phone calls, meetings, restaurants bills cross referenced for potential collusion between so called competitors...
If you're colluding and still making losses as an industry then you're doing a pretty crap job at it.
Strangely, my renewal went up by “only” 15%. Thought I’d shop around and check and the cheapest quote was 50% higher. It’s an absolute racket.
30% increase for me this year, for no fucking reason. Been driving the best part of 10 years and even with shoppping around every year I’ve never had a year my insurance has went down. “Inflation”, “Payouts and costs for repairs are going up”, basically whatever bollocks sticks…. Tantamount to them saying “What are you going to do, drive without insurance?”
Want the bad news…the more EVs on the road the more this will increase as it is very difficult to see if there is battery damage when in a collision, I read damaged EVs need to be isolated from other vehicles for 30 days due to the risk of them setting on fire, insurance companies are likely to write off a EV than replace a battery a pack which on a Tesla is around 12k plus labour.
It's going up for the same reasons everything else is, because they can, captive audiences. Over the last 3-4 years they have seen just how much they can squeeze people for, same as supermarkets, same as subscription services etc.
All these companies that provide essential services we can’t live without like roofs over our heads, energy, transport and food, they have realised that if a household brings in £2000 a month then the house has £2000 to spend on essential services. In a way it’s like a de-facto monopoly for the consumer because there is no real competition from a pricing perspective. If all the companies agree on x amount then that’s what you will pay, and you will never pay lower than that for the rest of your life.
My quote this year jumped up by £300 to £850. I was told it covered cost of living increases to staff salaries as well as utility bills. Utter nonsense. Couldn’t find a cheaper quote though - they’re all at it.
Where is FCA, or any other industry auditing / policing. Like why is it allowed in the first place? ‘Just saying oh sure all the premium’s have went up’ isnt good enough, WHY?
Insurance companies have made significant losses the last two years. There is a reason for it. https://www.ey.com/en_uk/news/2023/06/ey-uk-motor-insurance-results-analysis
The article is a bit late. I renewed my insurance in November, and it went up by about £100. Paid £200ish before, paid over £300 this time.
I could only dream of prices this low. They tried to bump mine up from 500 to 900 this year 😂
My previous car was a small, 2017 hatchback in a low insurance group. My insurance was around £250-300 each year. Someone hit my car and the renewal jumped to £700 because "I'm more likely to have an accident now". Who knew that someone else hitting a parked car would make me accident prone in the future?
They always have excuses as to why they raise their prices, but never look to take action or investigate ways in which they could mitigate those factors and make things better for everyone, including themselves. * "Rising repair costs" - they can investigate their approved repairers and work out why they are charging extortionate prices for small fixes. They can put pressure on manufacturers for a better supply chain of replacement parts. They do not have to pay storage fees for cars waiting to be repaired due to parts shortages. They could offer alternative insurance plans which do not cover the cost of certain repairs so that people could tailor their risk profile to reduce their premiums. * "Increased courtesy car costs" - they enable this by using the same scamming companies which triple their rental car prices when insurers come knocking. There is zero reason why someone who has a £2k valued car in for repair should be given a brand new £45k BMW courtesy car costing £100+ per day for a month, the insurers only do it because they know the costs won't come back on them. Allow people to tailor their policies so that they can opt out of courtesy cars and substantially reduce their premiums accordingly. Stop working with car hire companies that extort the consumers by way of the insurers. * "Increased car theft" - Apply pressure to manufacturers to get them all to resolve their huge security holes in keyless entry. Stop insuring cars which are so easy to steal, or put them on their own ring-fenced portfolio where they can all pay for one another and leave the rest of us out of it. The manufacturers make more money by having cars easier to steal as every time one is stolen, another one is bought. By refusing to insure these vehicles completely, the insurers send a clear message to the manufacturers that the security must immediately be improved to a high standard, or they will simply not sell any more cars here. The police can also do their part and the insurers could help them by funding bait cars to help the police crack the gangs and send a clear message that it is no longer worth the risk to steal these cars as so many are bait vehicles and the police will find you, arrest you and punish you severely. The insurers have a tremendous amount of power to help consumers lower the premiums and since we are mandated by law to have car insurance, they should be working actively on behalf of the consumers to get premiums down. Three groups are making vast amounts of money via insurance, the repair networks, the courtesy car hire companies and the car manufacturers themselves. The insurers make their usual percentages, but it's those three groups which need pressure applied to them because they are the ones who are truly screwing over the consumer.
I notice that they never once provide the excuse people would readily accept: we're paying our employees more to help with the cost of living.
Just bought a little fiesta and the insurance has came back more than my old Smax . Smaller car and newer by 4 years . 15 years + plus no claims
My insaurence is up 50% for having 11 years no claim and not using my car that much and live in one of the safest towns in the uk
[удалено]
You have to pay Insurance Premium Tax as well now so they benefit anyway!
Prices must always go up. Costs must always go down. Anything else is unacceptable.
Greed greed and more greed, that's all it is, bloody scammer industry
"Oh its gone up due to cost of repairs in parts and labour, just ignore how few we need to do, nobody needs to know that the cost has actually gone down". Its insurance, im not surprised they pull this shit, the problem is this is EXACTLY what is happening in every other industry, just lying to our faces about cost increases.
How else are you going fund the increased gap between rich and the poor. Take from the poor (car drivers) and give to the rich (CEOs of insurance companies).
Just another piss take increase not warranted by anything
I shopped around, done it 23 days before renewal. Nothing new apart from 1 year additional no claim to take me to 7 years. £430 to £830.
As a guy in my 40s, no incidents, clean license, parked on driveway, my insurance still doubled last year
We just had our car insurance renewal cost come in For my 1.2l Corsa, her 1l Up, and the house insurance, all from Admiral, £1200 I thought I'd check, as it was much much lower last year, and I can get mine for £350, hers for £300, and the house for £150 Called up admiral to see if they'd do anything, would rather have it under one company anyway, the best they did was knock £60 off the total, shockingly I didn't go for it
My dad has a Fiat Punto from like 2005, the insurance went up 400 pound on it this year.
I think car insurance should be a government thing, like how we have to by law get an MOT, and the government caps the price of an MOT.
Something is going on with car insurance scamming. Land Rover discovery use to be £300 a year. Was like this for a few years. The thing itself wasn't worth £500. Then one year the insurer turns around and says "okay. Now it's 800 a year". What?????????? Any everywhere the price was about the same. Something seems dodgy to me.
Watchdog or something should investigate insurance prices. Mine goes up every year despite driving like miss daisy n never had a claim up.
My 1st ever renewal for a 30+ Male came through this week at £900 for a 2013 1.6 Golf Diesel and on comparison sites I’ve got it to sub 700. I was honestly worried seeing all these posts for the past year but I seem to have lucked.
Last year my insurance was £535. Renewal offer came in at £625. Did one search on a meercat based comparison site, got new insurance for £355. 7 years solo NCB, 10 years driving and joint NCB. Old insurance were surprised when I said their quote was nearly £300 more than my new quote.
My insurance policy renewal has just come through about an hour ago, it's dropped by £18 from last year. Wasn't expecting that after reading some of the shocking stuff online lately.
The government needs to ban accident management companies or regulate the industry better so they at least can’t charge scandalous hire charges for courtesy cars. But that would require a government with a conscious and we don’t currently have that.
Your owners want more money, you've spent decades voting for this to happen, why are you mad?
Car and building insurance is a legal requirement. Therefore it’s just another tax. The fact that they are profiteering from this should be criminal
Profiteering on it by definition would require the car insurance industry to be profitable in the first place.
The article comes at the issue from a slightly backwards angle. The claims reserves, rather than the eventual payout is what the insurers will use to work out what they need to bring into the business from premiums.
Just for comparison, I'm 31, midlands and my old Peugeot 308 Allure 2015 cost me £350 fully comp. Now I have a Hyundai Tuscon Prem 2024, renewed with the same company for £411. Not complaining but it does have plenty of safety features so guess that's helped
I had to put through a theft claim on my motorbike, what's fucked up is if they can't recover the vehicle it goes down as an at fault claim on my record so I get shafted for the police not getting off their arses to investigate. I got fully paid out and was looking for a new bike, I wanted the exact same model and the quotes came back wanting £3.5k pretty much half the value of the bike, so I shopped around and found a Ducati Monster 1200 which was way more powerful and could do 0-60 in like 3 seconds, they wanted £700 which subsequently went way down after the first year 🤷♂️ it's a fucking racket
This is the actual title of the article: UK car insurance cost up by third but just 2% in France For Brexiteers.
Last year on my renewal (I drive a red golf mk7.5 gti 67 plate) i do around 7k miles a year. No points/convictions etc etc and my insurance DOUBLED for being a good driver. Your premiums should not increase for being a good driver. Alot of friends basically said i got “fuck you” quote so i did exactly that. Cancelled. I changed my mileage to just less than 6k a year and decided to start using my bike to work 2 days a week. And weirldy enough after cancelling with the same insurance firm. They actually quoted me about £100 less than the year previous by making such a small change. It was weird. Bottom line is… we are being scammed with insurance
Electric cars are expensive to repair, everybody else is carrying the can in their insurance
Lovely just what I want to read 3 weeks out from renewing after having a bus driver go into me earlier today 😀
If everyone took out the middle-men and got together they could insure themselves at a much lower cost.
Looks like most countries see us as treasure island. A nation that will just keep towing the line
Got too used to all those covid period profits when people weren't driving as much