Insurance, oh golly

[Wintrup]

It's that time again to sink down into the sewer and try to get the best deal from the motley bunch of brokers who're intent squeezing every last pip out of me. Around the first mucky bend, Carole Nash who tried it on by asking me to pay an extra £15 to go through the details of a quote I'd got from a 'Compare' site. I gave them short shrift and moved on to the Hastings, who I swore I'd never do business with again after they tried to auto renew without my consent last time I insured with them. But hey, they're all as dirty as each other and I managed to do the whole thing online and thereby avoided being subjected to usual extras sales pitches and rudeness. It's these sales rabble and their devious patter that is so off putting. Not much of a career being a cubicle wage slave and I'd feel more sympathetic toward them if they were only more polite.
Then I phoned my present broker to circumvent them autorenewing my policy, no answer so I left a message. And just when I thought I'd done with this horrid yearly chore, the phone rang and on the other end was a girl with most courteous, sweet feminine voice from my present insurer. I told her that, unfortunately I had taken out a policy with another company and she all but called me 'naughty' for not phoning earlier so she could see what she could do. Shame, I'd likely have paid £20 over the best price just listen to her speak.

 

[TN_twowheeladdict]

You know what they say about great voice and personality.

 

[Wintrup]

So I saved £35 by not renewing with Bemoto and going with Hastings. Bemoto had excellent customer service, being easy to contact and having polite native English people on the other end of the phone that I could banter with. This morning I had to contact Hastings because they got a detail wrong on the policy and I wanted to opt out of default autorenewal (more of that later). By the time I'd got through to Timbuktu or wherever it was I had to sit through a minutes of useless information and was almost pulling my hair out when I finally got a person to speak to. Lord knows what country my call landed in, but the guy was polite enough, if a little hard to understand. Now I concerned that if I had an accident and had to go through all that again out on the road, shaken up and stressed, I'd regret not paying the extra.

Autorenewing insurance. No biker I know would want his policy to autorenew, yet it's ubiquitous. It's just an exploitative practice, since most new quotes are significantly higher than the previous, hundred of £s in a few cases I know of. Seldom do bikers renew with the same broker these days because of the hike. If we had a functional ombudsman it would be stopped, but I can't think of one regulating authority that really serves the public interest. This practice of opting people in for all sorts of 'extras' is everywhere these days, usually obscured in small print or, as with Amazon Prime, programmed for you to take that route unless you spot it and navigate out.

Now I'm semi-retired and live in a rural part of England, I rarely have to deal with this kind of the nonsense that is part and parcel of 'normal' life these days, where courtesy and honesty are sadly often missing. I feel sorry for all the youngsters out there that never lived in a Britain that wasn't this dystopic. Rant over.

 

[Rick C]

I think most of us suffer the same every year, and we all get different treatment from the brokers. Many people have major problems with Carol Nash, but I have found them great with my bike insurance. I wish I could say the same about my car insurance with them, they said they auto renewed but it did not happen, leaving me un-insured for a week. Not good. So my cars get insured elsewhere, but I can't find anyone to match them for my bikes.

 

[Wintrup]

I think most of us suffer the same every year, and we all get different treatment from the brokers. Many people have major problems with Carol Nash, but I have found them great with my bike insurance. I wish I could say the same about my car insurance with them, they said they auto renewed but it did not happen, leaving me un-insured for a week. Not good. So my cars get insured elsewhere, but I can't find anyone to match them for my bikes.

There's no rhyme or reason. Apart from the institutional sharp practices, a good or bad experience can just be the person on the other end of the phone. Some just rifle off their spiel so fast you can't keep up. That's when mistakes happen, which I think may be the intent a lot of the time. These days I have to have a list in front of me. It used to be you simply stated a few relevant facts and that was it. Now they've created so many variables it leaves you thinking 'what loophole have I left for them to deny me a payout'. I could lay all the blame on insurance companies, but we've imported a lot of fraudster practices imo, like the whiplash scam. This creates a bad faith attitude in the brokers who then want their pound of flesh from the punters.

 

[johnny42]

Only answer if you want to, but I'm really curious as to how much insurance costs for the Himma where you are. Here, we need liability coverage. Comprehensive and Collision are optional (unless you've financed the bike payments.) Of course, you can add on more coverages, but most don't (on their Motorcycle policies). Assuming you have comp, collision and liability, how dear is the premium? And do carriers allow you to bundle auto, home and Motorcycle?

Plus, over hear there are any number of carriers where you can insure your bike on-line, so no pesky salespersons.

 

[TN_twowheeladdict]

Only answer if you want to, but I'm really curious as to how much insurance costs for the Himma where you are. Here, we need liability coverage. Comprehensive and Collision are optional (unless you've financed the bike payments.) Of course, you can add on more coverages, but most don't (on their Motorcycle policies). Assuming you have comp, collision and liability, how dear is the premium? And do carriers allow you to bundle auto, home and Motorcycle?

Plus, over hear there are any number of carriers where you can insure your bike on-line, so no pesky salespersons.

I have full coverage (liability, comprehensive, and collision) on the Himalayan. $66.78 for 12 months.

 

[Wintrup]

Blimey, $66 for fully comprehensive, that about £52.
I don't bother getting a quote for full com , just third party, fire and theft, no pillion, commuting. The average price quoted this year was $145. The quote I took up was an anomaly at $97.

 

[TN_twowheeladdict]

Blimey, $66 for fully comprehensive, that about £52.
I don't bother getting a quote for full com , just third party, fire and theft, no pillion, commuting. The average price quoted this year was $145. The quote I took up was an anomaly at $97.

There are so many variable that go into an insurance policy quote that it is almost impossible to compare insurance costs between people for the same motorcycle.