To distrust all car insurers? Any to recommend? Are Bell horrendous?

[lill72]

I need to pick an insurer - help!!! Tell me your opinions.

My cheapest quotes are Bell, Churchill and Privelage.

Admiral have been good for the couple of claims I've made through them.

Direct line weren't. I would give up driving rather than give them my custom after the way they dealt with me and DH (2 separate claims). I don't know how anyone can turn "a car came around the corner on the wrong side of the road, drove head on into me before speeding off and nearly knocking over 2 cyclists as they went round the next corner" into "I drove into a parked car". And not tell me.

Garages charge more for insurance work because it's guaranteed. Any problems and they have to fix it for free. (I rejected a repair 5 times because they couldn't get the bonnet lined up equally either side). They don't just hve to get it roadworthy again. Their responsibility goes further. (A friend crashed my car and all 4 alloys were replaced just in case they'd been weakened invisibly.)

The third party insurers were wrong - you had the right to deal with them directly (and they save money doing it that way too).

And quotes are given in commercial confidence. They won't be shared with customers.

I've been with Aviva for a few years now and had no problems with them.

Yes a lot of the paperwork side of stuff is held online but they deal with you over the phone if you have any queries and if you need to make a claim.

I had to claim a year ago and they were very helpful and efficient. Sorted everything out quickly and with minimal fuss.

We use Admiral and they dealt with a claim on my insurance that I made as a new driver (wrote my car off) and were fab. Diamond offered me a better deal when it came to renewing so Admiral matched it when I phoned them about my policy. Excellent service.

If that's the case Disappointedone why did they agree to send it to me, send me blank pages (which they said was an error) and then email me the quote in full?

AVOID CHURCHILL. I started a thread recently about the problems I am having wuth them. They have no case ownership (they told me this), mis-sold the policy and are quite 'anti' their own clients. They are also wrong on the advice they give. 'Only independent witness statements are admissible in court'. Erm, no.
Also, unless you chase them, nothing is done. Again by ther own admission.
I cannot stress how awful the have been. Currently going to the ombudsman.

Have to say Churchill was very good when a driver insured through them went into my car. Didn't have to go through my insurers Churchill dealt with it all.

Aviva were ace when their insured slammed into the back of me last spring. They phoned me within 30 mins to sort out a hire car and the money for the kids car seats which all needed replacing was in my account the next day.

I wish I had let them deal with the whole claim. My own insurers, octagon were worse than pissing useless. At one point they couldn't send out an engineer to do the total loss report, as they couldn't remember which recovery firm they had instructed

Privilige are great when it comes to making a claim, they are part of direct line and they do all the claim handling. We had house insurance with them when we were burgled.
Axa and the post office are a shower of shite though. I had nothing but problems with both of them blaming the other and the claims assessor was awful. That was a water leak on our buildings insurance.

I'm with LV for the 4th year running. Fully Comp on an absolute shocker of a 13 year old car has come in at 247 just today. Never had to claim but they were very helpful over a claim on a travel insurance policy.

Churchill and Priveluge are part of the same group. They are both part of RBS Insurance. Same company different brand names. Never heard of Bell.

Excuse typos.

I can recommend Swift Cover. Just had to make a claim and spoke to someone in the UK and had it all sorted within minutes.

catsize - what is no case ownership? where is your thread -I would be interested to read.

ahh i do not know what to do. i am limited to my options as this is the first time i have got insurance in the uk - so it is outrageously expensive through certain insurers, so I am stuck with a few. I don;t have the choice to got through anyone. Direct Line someone does not like - any other thoughts ?

Try Co-op Insurance. I've found them very reliable and no more expensive than the Churchill group. Plus their help desk are very friendly people in Manchester, not half-way round the planet.

OP, here is the thread - just a little one.

Churchill thread

No case ownership means that nobody is allocated to deal with your claim.
So, I reported it and the lady then said to call back in a few days if I hadn't heard anything. Sadly, she knew I wouldn't hear anything. A standard letter came through. I contacted them again in two weeks to find nothing had been done. They hadn't even contacted the other side. The man on the phone actually said they won't do anything unless the customer chases it. There have been many problems.
If you read the thread, I say about texts from the other driver. They are now saying I never mentioned them to them, as there is no note on the system (?) and even if I did, they don't prove anything. Right...

Oh, and bottom line - I am having to take the guy to court myself as Churchill won't.

I had the kind of hassle outlined above when someone shunted me from the back last November. Hastings Direct's system mean that we had to sign an elaborate 'Credit Agreement' (the small print would have taken a week to read), and the claim was handed to a claims management company. Despite the other party quickly admitting liability, it took hours, lots of patience & assertiveness on the phone to progress the claim, get a hire car, schedule the repair work, and ensure that our NCB was preserved. The various contractors involved all used different claims ref numbers & didn't communicate with each other, at a busy time you don't need that kind of hassle.

Not worth the cheap premium, we paid £100 more to insure with Direct Line this year.

If someone else is clearly at fault, eg drinking into the back of you, there's no reason whatsoever to use your insurer's claims management or use credit hire. Deal directly with the third party insurers. They want to minimise outlay so will work more quickly to sort things out. It's much less hassle.

To add insult to injury, all Hastings actually did was to sell our data to multiple ambulance-chasing legal claims companies, so the phone didn't stop ringing while I was getting over the whiplash.

I checked with Direct Line that they don't operate this type of system, and can now understand why they cost slightly more on the premium.

If my accident had not been straightforward & there was disputed liability, I would gave found it very difficult to organise the estimate, repair, replacement etc. without worry about re-imbursement. DH had to take a day off work & on phone to sort it all out in the end.

We would never touch a company which used this system again.

this is all so useful thank you - although sorry the info comes from your own bad experiences.

I do have a good quote from Direct Line - not much more than Churchill. So even though they are owned by the same people, they operte differently?

sorry have I got this wrong - re same company?

Direct line is also part of RBS Insurance. Yes even though they are the same company using the same u/w they have different strategies. They want different customer profiles.

A few years ago I was with elephant,
They sent me a renewal quote and I rang them up to say no thanks.
Next day I notice 500 quid give or take, can't remember exact amount had been taken from my account.
I rang them up and they said someone must have pressed the wrong button.
Took about a week to get a refund and I received no goodwill gesture.
So regardless of the quote, I won't be using them again