Do all insurance Co. rip you off?

Have just contacted my insurance to let them know that the Mrs has now passed her test and therefore has a full license, thinking there may be some reimbursement to come. "Thank you sir for letting us know", replied the less than useful sales person on the other end of the phone, "that'll be an extra £35.00 for admin charges and no reimbursement". I asked them to waive the fee, but they were having less than none of it.

Are they 'aving a larf? She's only got a 125 and the 35 quid is almost 50% of the policy value!! Are all insurance the same or are wastings direct just a bunch of con artists?

[Bibio]

yes. they are a law unto themselves. and what does our precious government do..... nowt but bend over and let them rape the people. we need insurance to derive/ride on the road and they know this therefore we are subject to what ever they see fit to charge as a premium. its only going to get worse till our government grow a pair and sort it out and thats never going to happen.

[TamSV]

That's the business model for motor insurance these days. Flog it through comparison sites at zero or sometimes even negative commission. So the broker makes no money or maybe loses a bit but they keep their premium down at the time when there's some competition.

However, they know that a % of their customers will make some kind of change to their policy during the year. At that point there's no competition as you've got little choice but to stick with them so they are able to collect a fee.

A further % will have a claim. If it's not your fault they'll sell your details to an accident management company. If the accident was your fault, they'll sell the third party details.

The insurance is a loss-leader these days - it's used to sell add-ons, collect mid-term fees and farm claims.

Think about it though. The premium here was £70. Average motor commission is around 10% for the broker if he's lucky. If they needed to make their money on the initial sale they would have had to charge you at least that £35 to make it worth their while.

[Messie]

Originally Posted by Bibio

yes. they are a law unto themselves. and what does our precious government do..... nowt but bend over and let them rape the people. we need insurance to derive/ride on the road and they know this therefore we are subject to what ever they see fit to charge as a premium. its only going to get worse till our government grow a pair and sort it out and thats never going to happen.

Hang on, I'm confused. Wasn't everything the last Government's fault?

[Bibio]

yes....

[TamSV]

Originally Posted by Bibio

and what does our precious government do......

Governments of various colours do things like this...

- Pass social costs such as invalidity/unemployment benefits and NHS/Ambulance costs on to insurers via the Compensation Recovery Unit.

- Refuse to allocate adequate resources to flood defences and then collect massive VAT receipts from the (insured) repair work after the inevitable flooding.

- Axe Legal Aid for personal injury claims and pass ill thought-out legislation that creates an entirely new industry of "no win - no fee" ambulance chasers charging fees that would make your eyes water.

Lots of things that were once delivered by the state are now paid for by insurance companies who then have to collect that money from policyholders - a tax on the prudent.

So Govt get to keep taxes low and insurance companies take the flack - which is fine, cause as we all know they're c***s anyway.

They happily took £35 off me as I notified them of my end can.... I totally forgot to tell the last lot when I got my full licence, sounds like that was for the best!

no, you buy a policy and agree to thier terms and cons, this includes admin fees etc..

if do you mean insurance companies are expensive... then yes..

[Dave20046]

Originally Posted by 454697819

no, you buy a policy and agree to thier terms and cons, this includes admin fees etc..

if do you mean insurance companies are expensive... then yes..

c'mon it's still underhand even if technically legitimate.

Yes.

The worse one I had was claiming on my leather cover.
£50 excess.
For every item!