Just had a bit of a surprise when trying to renew my B's insurance. Apparently, the quote I accepted last year (from the AA, via Compare the Meerkat) was based on it being a RHD, so technically my policy for the last year has been invalid!

Now I know jolly well that, when I gave my details to the nice meerkat people last year, I disclosed that my B is a LHD, and indeed my AA policy document states that the Make & Model is a "Fiat Barchetta Cabriolet (LHD)". But in the detailed schedule of cover (buried in the small print) it says that it's a RHD, and the AA's view is that the policy may not therefore be valid.

Having uncovered this error (a long story in itself - I phoned them to query another aspect of the policy), my original renewal quote of £179 (which I was well chuffed with) was revised to something well north of £200. Doh!

I wonder what my position would have been if I'd had to make a claim this year? Insurance contracts are uberrimae fidei (in the utmost good faith) which means that the onus is on the insured to ensure that all the details are correct.

So, even if you've told those nice meerkats (or that irritating opera-singer with the twirly moustache, or any of the other insurance comparison sites) that your B is LHD, do make sure that the small print of your insurance documents doesn't record it as RHD, or you may find yourself in a spot of bother if you need to make a claim on the policy.

I've just renewed with LV (Liverpool Victoria). It cost me £184 fully comp with PNC, £0 vol excess and legal protection. And I checked carefully that the quote was for a LHD!

That is terrible - good advice to check the documents but you're insurance company should know better. The Barchetta is standard as a LHD car. RHD was never a dealer option. It was a modification - there are a small amount like 7 ever converted in the UK. I think the insurance company messed up.

I am just about to renew my policy or possibly change. Hope I can get a below £200 quote this year.

The irony being, of course, that if my B had been RHD, I'd have had to declare that it was modified, and no doubt would then have been charged an additional premium on that account!

Heads they win, tails we lose!

I agree, I think the insurance company is at fault here. If you organise your insurance online and select the vehicle, model etc. from a menu, you can only assume that the premium quoted relates to the vehicle listed. However your post is an important reminder about how insurance companies can wriggle!

A few years ago when my son got his first car, he was quoted what appeared to be a very decent price with Elephant online and subsequently clicked all the boxes and paid the premium. The insurance came up for renewal a bit sooner than he expected and it was only then that he realised he had only paid for ten months and not twelve - hence the cheaper premium! When he considered going elsewhere for the renewal, he found that the other companies wouldnt recognise Elephants NCB as it had been for twelve months. He reluctantly had to stay with Elephant but switched to a twelve month premium. As you pointed out, we must learn to read the small print. Steve

The disadvantage of doing it online, you get a web discount but any errors be on your head and not the insurers.

The problem arises because, in order to be able to generate 150+ quotes in 30 seconds, the quotes that you get from insurance companies via comparison websites are based on a number of assumptions (including, predictably in the UK, that the car is RHD), so even if you've included that information when entering your data initially, the individual firms involved may not screen for whether the car is LHD/RHD when giving a quote.

Some firms do screen for LHD/RHD before quoting via comparison websites. When I ran my details through those nice meerkats again, but with the car as RHD, I got a quote of only £122 from Saga (yes, I'm dismayed to report that I am sufficiently grey-bearded to qualify), but when I changed the car to LHD, their quote rocketed to well over £200. Pah!

Having had an LHD car myself I fail to see that there is any real extra risk about 50% of time you see better with left than right and it actually makes you more aware of hazards of anything

rossocorsa said:

Having had an LHD car myself I fail to see that there is any real extra risk about 50% of time you see better with left than right and it actually makes you more aware of hazards of anything

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Totally agree with you. I expect it is just another cynical excuse for greedy insurance companies to squeeze more money from customers.

rossocorsa said:

Having had an LHD car myself I fail to see that there is any real extra risk about 50% of time you see better with left than right and it actually makes you more aware of hazards of anything

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Richpea said:

Totally agree with you. I expect it is just another cynical excuse for greedy insurance companies to squeeze more money from customers.

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And this is why you don't price insurance. So many people who think they know how it works when unfortunatly they haven't a clue. Its not only the liklyhood of having an accident which comes into calculations of a UK insurance premium

rossocorsa said:

Having had an LHD car myself I fail to see that there is any real extra risk about 50% of time you see better with left than right and it actually makes you more aware of hazards of anything

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I regularly swap between the Barch and either a Cinquecento or a 159. My experiences aren't the same as yours - I find overtaking can generally be more difficult unless it's on a slight left hand bend, that rear three quarter vision is poor with the hood up - especially at night on a motorway.

And don't get me started on automatic car park ticket machines or drive-thru's

HP said:

I regularly swap between the Barch and either a Cinquecento or a 159. My experiences aren't the same as yours - I find overtaking can generally be more difficult unless it's on a slight left hand bend, that rear three quarter vision is poor with the hood up - especially at night on a motorway.

And don't get me started on automatic car park ticket machines or drive-thru's

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I suppose it makes a difference when its in a small hatchback and with nearly 200bhp ;-)

Yes, you can crash so much faster

Does 130 bhp/te count for the Cinq?

I agree with you Pete. Whilst driving a LHD car is novel, it isn't easy and certain manoeuvres, particularly merging from a slip road onto a dual carriageway need a lot of care. Drive safely ... Steve

bumble said:

I agree with you Pete. Whilst driving a LHD car is novel, it isn't easy and certain manoeuvres, particularly merging from a slip road onto a dual carriageway need a lot of care. Drive safely ... Steve

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I had an lhd car for about 7 years and I honestly didn't find it a major issue except at toll booths and car parks, there were times when I had a less favourable view but in others I had a better one and on the motorway it was much easier to see cars in what would be the blind spot on a RHD car. Have to say though that the car was from 1999 and general visibility in cars is getting worse and worse every year due to thicker pillars for safety and so on.....having the edge on power did help of course in terms of overtaking manoeuvres but overall it made me look a lot more carefully before taking action.

With apologies for reviving an very old thread of mine, I thought folks might like to know that Adrian Flux seem to be very competitive on B insurance at the moment. I've just renewed fully comp for only £91 (including EU and legal expenses cover, with a £300 excess and a 3k mileage limit), which is £55 less than the best quote I had from the furry little meerkats. The non-standard exhaust only put an extra £3 on the quote.

I got an online quote from them first, which was for £108 (their online quotation process is a right pain, as it asks for a shed-load of detailed information, like the actual date you passed your test - that had me scratching my head, as it was sometime in 1972 lol), but it proved worthwhile making a follow-up phone call to see if they could beat the online price, which they claim to be able to do in 70% of cases.

Hi,
If anyone needs any help with insurance at all then please feel free to drop me a line.
Regards,
Dan.

Well spotted, Dan!