dawpooldad
New member
- Joined
- Oct 25, 2010
- Messages
- 19
- Points
- 8
Hi,
Just recently, on three occasions, I've noticed a worrying trend amongst 3 different insurance companies to quietly "drop" previously held options on policy renewals.
The first incident was when rewewing our other car's policy (Skoda Octavia)with Aviva. I'd gone through the "Compare the Meerkats" thing only to find that the renewal quote was the better one, so I opted for that.
When the new documents came through everything looked Ok, so that was it, I thought, nothing appeared to have changed and I was covered as per the previous policy.
Then the second policy renewal for our Panda arrived from Priviledge. This car is owned by the wife (much green eyed envy here!!) and again she had done the "go compare" thing (she likes to save money for handbags, shoes, hairdos etc!). Once again, the renewal quote appeared to be the best one so she went with that.
When the documents arrived she duly filed them away thinking everything was Ok.
Now enter the renewal for the Dog!!! Reading through the letter from Tesco, they told us that in future the policy would be underwritten by Royal Sun Alliance and not the previous insurers.
Of course, the premium had gone up an extra £3 a month and after looking at the cover options I noticed that the 3rd party liability cover was missing. This covers against the dog biting or causing injury (not that she would, more chance of getting bitten by the wife!) and/or legal costs up to a million quid!
I promptly 'phoned them and asked why, if the option was missing, had the premium gone up?
The guy (surprisingly located in this country with an accent I could understand!) said that there had been a problem with this option and that there had been lots of complaints about it. "What would have happened if I hadn't have 'phoned up and asked for it?" I asked . Long silence.............. "When will it go back on?" I asked, Long silence again.:idea: He then told me not to worry, that it had been flagged and that it would be re-applied and amended documents would be issued.
I'm still waiting.
This prompted me to revisit the other renewals and I found that Aviva had quietly dropped the "Guaranteed hire car" option and that Priviledge had dropped the "Protected no claims bonus" option.
Furious 'phone calls to both companies resulted in ".....but you didn't ask for them when you renewed" replies.
Apparently, having those options for the past 3 years isn't a pre-requisite to having them next year!!!!
I told them that the renewal letters stated that if we were renewing, then we didn't have to do anything!!!!!
The upshot of all this is, it cost a total of £66 to reinstate the these very necessary options and had I realised, it would have been cheaper to have gone else where! So both Aviva and Priviledge can go an get stuffed next time!
And the dog, well I'm going to wait 'til the end of the 30 day period and then tell RSA to get stuffed as well!!
Moral of long winded story:- Check your options carefully!!!!!!!
Rgds
Dawpooldad
Just recently, on three occasions, I've noticed a worrying trend amongst 3 different insurance companies to quietly "drop" previously held options on policy renewals.
The first incident was when rewewing our other car's policy (Skoda Octavia)with Aviva. I'd gone through the "Compare the Meerkats"
thing only to find that the renewal quote was the better one, so I opted for that. When the new documents came through everything looked Ok, so that was it, I thought, nothing appeared to have changed and I was covered as per the previous policy.
Then the second policy renewal for our Panda arrived from Priviledge. This car is owned by the wife (much green eyed envy here!!) and again she had done the "go compare" thing (she likes to save money for handbags, shoes, hairdos etc!
). Once again, the renewal quote appeared to be the best one so she went with that.When the documents arrived she duly filed them away thinking everything was Ok.
Now enter the renewal for the Dog!!! Reading through the letter from Tesco, they told us that in future the policy would be underwritten by Royal Sun Alliance and not the previous insurers.
Of course, the premium had gone up an extra £3 a month and after looking at the cover options I noticed that the 3rd party liability cover was missing. This covers against the dog biting or causing injury (not that she would, more chance of getting bitten by the wife!) and/or legal costs up to a million quid!
I promptly 'phoned them and asked why, if the option was missing, had the premium gone up?
The guy (surprisingly located in this country with an accent I could understand!) said that there had been a problem with this option and that there had been lots of complaints about it. "What would have happened if I hadn't have 'phoned up and asked for it?" I asked . Long silence.............. "When will it go back on?" I asked, Long silence again.:idea: He then told me not to worry, that it had been flagged and that it would be re-applied and amended documents would be issued.
I'm still waiting.
This prompted me to revisit the other renewals and I found that Aviva had quietly dropped the "Guaranteed hire car" option and that Priviledge had dropped the "Protected no claims bonus" option.
Furious 'phone calls to both companies resulted in ".....but you didn't ask for them when you renewed" replies.
Apparently, having those options for the past 3 years isn't a pre-requisite to having them next year!!!!
I told them that the renewal letters stated that if we were renewing, then we didn't have to do anything!!!!!
The upshot of all this is, it cost a total of £66 to reinstate the these very necessary options and had I realised, it would have been cheaper to have gone else where! So both Aviva and Priviledge can go an get stuffed next time!
And the dog, well I'm going to wait 'til the end of the 30 day period and then tell RSA to get stuffed as well!!
Moral of long winded story:- Check your options carefully!!!!!!!
Rgds
Dawpooldad
