What do I do about this? Car insurance :'(

[skyofdiamonds]

So,

Last year I paid £725 for my insurance with company A. In that year, children decided to throw snowballs at each other on my road and smashed my rear windscreen and ran away. Great.

I claimed for this on my insurance. I assumed as this was not my fault I would keep my no claims bonus.

This year, company A could offer me £620 per year.

I found quotes on comparison sites from £450. I decided to go for another company, company B. I ended up paying £480.

Company B have asked me to supply my no claims certificate, which I have. It states I had a 'non fault- accident' claim.

Company B have now said that due to this claim, they will take £250 extra in the next 7-10 days.

What can I do? Someone help me?

Is it too late to change back to my old one?

I paid it all off in one go on the 4th October, the same day I ended it with company A.

That was my savings gone for that month and now they want MORE money from me!

Assumingly you told company B that you had X Years of 'No Claims'?

You don't - you HAVE had a claim in that period. Making your No Claims discount void.

There's nothing you can do except pay. This would have been the same with any insurance company - No Claims means just that - NO claims.

I thought I had a year's no claims, as I didn't think a windscreen made a difference and I completely forgot about it!

I was a named driver for my first four years, and therefore have no no claims from before.

I thought windscreens didn't affect your NCD

I shattered my rear windscreen reversing (don't ask ) parallel to a wall that had an overhang.
Autoglass replaced it and my No Claims wasn't affected.

They don't affect your ncd.

Ask your new insurance company to speak to your old insurance company and verify that it was a windscreen. They are not classed as an insurance claim. Windscreen cover is different. They will not accept you telling them this. They will have to ask for the information themselves and the old insurance company will have to tell them. You will have to phone both companies and explain this and arrange for one to speak to the other. You will sit on hold for aaaaagges.

That should hopefully sort it out. It did for me. Any problems pm me.

Whether a windscreen claim affects your NCD all depends on your insurance company policy.

Some allow 1 glass claim a year, my DH's (company car, high mileage) allows 3 glass claims a year.

Unfortunately you're going to have to pay up. Or look for alternative quotes and cancel your cover with this new company if you find a better quote.

And if they don't sort it out you can cancel and get your money back (less the proportion of the premium for the time you've been insured by then to date and possibly a fee - check with them first). We had to cancel our policy recently and go with another company as they wouldn't insure me as a learner driver. We got a refund in proportion to the time remaining on the policy less a fee (think it was around £40).

How do I stop them automatically taking the extra £250 out?

I'm working 9-5 for the next two days. argh.

The reason they could not get the no claims proof themselves is because apparently Admiral do not speak to other insurance companies whatsoever and therefore the customer has to get this for them.

I guess that means they won;t speak about this too.

Will try and ring after 5 tomorrow.

Ask if you can paid the remainder by direct debit.

Is it because it was the rear window and not the front windscreen that the no claims bonus was affected?

Admirals cancellation policy HERE

You could cancel, pay the fee and go to another company where you can spread the costs.

It sounds like it has been counted as a claim. However as it wasn't your fault then your NCB wasn't effected.

Fault doesn't matter it was a claim

Firstly did you check your 4 years named driver doesn't count. My company would give me driving experience for that (nearly the same discount as ncd). Also axa said that they were happy to turn this into 4 yrs no claims discount.

Windscreen wise its worth checking its been logged right. Mine is down as glass repairs.

With some companies a windscreen repair doesn't affect your No Claims but a replacement will freeze it. If you started with 0 years then you probably have 0 years still.

Check with your new insurer if the extra cost is based on the no claims reduction or both that and you having a 'fault' claim.

If so the extra cost might not be as much if you can get confirmation from your old company that it was just a windscreen claim.

Check with the new company that they have the info about your claim correct. In some cases I have seen windscreen claims captured incorrectly as accident damage/malicious damage etc. If it is incorrect then ask them if they got the info from the CUE database. If they say yes then you will need to speak to your OLD insurers to get this updated. Your new insurers cannot do this on your behalf, and even if they change their own records unless the CUE is updated this will happen every time you switch insurers.
Providing that the info is correct then the price increase will have to be paid I'm afraid. It is a common misconception that having a non fault claim and not losing NCD means no premium increase. Unfortunately this isn't usually the case. NCD gives you a certain discount, but your insurers will take any claims into account when calculating your risk. It's an extreme example but what I always say to people is imagine if you had a non fault claim every day for the whole year you were insurer. Yes they weren't your fault, but by the very virtue of being involved in so many you are automatically a higher risk than someone who's had none.
My best advice is to call the new company, ask if that's the best price they can do. If they work with a panel of insurers see if anyone is cheaper. If not then weigh up the cancellation cost vs the price you get from your old insurers and see which works out better. Just make sure that your old providers have the correct claims info too.
DISCLAIMER: I work for one of the biggest insurance companies in the UK, the advice I gave you is in my experience correct but certain other companies may have different rules.

Oh, also the other thing to check is if they now have the info on your policy twice. With CUE sometimes they will have the info you gave them and then also the info that CUE gave them, which can cause a premium hike. I'm guessing this isn't the case with you as you stated that you forgot about it completely, so may not have given the info to start with but it's worth checking.

When you received the renewal it should have included your details for you to accept / decline the policy. Did it not say there about a claim or if there was no claims to carry forward?

I've never had a policy that counted windscreens as a claim.

My insurance company also said they didn't speak to other insurance companies. Luckily the chap I was talking to had a modicum of common sense and said he'd give them a ring. He said they wouldn't be able to directly tell him but if he asked the question they would be able to say yes or no!

Windscreen cover is usually separate to bodywork and doesn't count as a claim. Get back to them and don't take no for an answer!

Is admiral company A? Im insured there. They're open until 9pm. Ring customer services. As long as it was simply a glass claim it shouldn't effect your no claims bonus - it will only have counted as a claim if a garage had to fix any damage around the window or any damage elsewhere on the claim.
Also, they may not speak directly to the other company but get them to confirm to you how many years no claims bonus you had and ask them to send the info to you in writing by email and post - then you can forward the email to the new insurance company
hth x

It's not a windscreen. It's the rear window.