Has anybody been able to continue driving after having an insurance policy cancelled? I’m in bits

[GraceyBeaker]

I’m mid 20s. Passed my test yesterday, absolutely over the moon. I have a car ready for me, my partner’s old one. It’s a 2007 Yaris. The car did fail its MOT a month ago but it’s only a small part replacement that we will get round to doing now that I’ve passed. It’s essential I drive ASAP for various reasons. It’s too far to walk to most places and I can’t do buses, within 5 minutes of being on a bus I have to get off to be sick. I have severe motion sickness on buses.

Problem is, I don’t think I can afford any insurance. When I was 18 I tried learning with my dad and used a monetary gift from my grandparents to buy a little car. We arranged learners insurance, a black box policy. When filling in the forms we said we’d be practicing 2x times a week. However, my dad never kept to his promise of practicing with me, constantly fobbing me off when I asked and so we went months without using the car. This made the insurance company think we had turned the black box off and were driving without it, which resulted in them cancelling the policy. I received notice at the time that they were cancelling the policy but being a naive 18 year old I never realised it would affect me going forward, so I just let it happen.

Now when applying for insurance I have to declare I’ve had a cancelled policy, and my quotes are all £8000+. I have no idea what to do, I feel like I’m being treated like a criminal.

Any advice?

It’s a great idea of the PPs

I don’t think sadly your letter is going yo get you anywhere, so it’s going to take a while to sort. If you could get one of the columnists onto it - and it’s a good cautionary tale so it will appeal to them - things could move a lot faster

That's soft checks that companies cant see.

What’s the point of posting this?

You have no actual knowledge and you just want to kick the OP.

That won't be enough to uphold the complaint to the FOS. they sent it, you received it. That letter not being on the online portal will not be enough for the FOS to find in your favour. You will have to demonstrate that they treated you unfairly, however if their terms state the device has to receive data or they will cancel the insurance then they are within their rights to cancel the policy as you haven't upheld your end of the bargain. If you'd canceled the insurance yourself when you received that warning letter on the basis that you weren't going to drive the car enough, you wouldn't have a cancellation on your record - just in case anyone else finds themselves in that position - cancel it yourself first.

There are databases where insurers can see if someone has previously had insurance cancelled - insurance companies share all sorts of information.

Look for specialist brokers such as adrian flux where you might be able to explain the circumstances and hopefully get a better premium.

Not true. The reason you didn't have any issues is because you didn't do anything out of the ordinary to flag up for review. It's absolutely possible for insurers to see what details have been used to obtain quotes and it's very easy to see when quotes have been manipulated and potentially false details used to get a cheaper premium or to get cover when normally that insurer wouldn't have accepted that risk (I work in this area). If you did two quotes, one with the cancellation declared, and one without, and you took the policy out with it NOT declared - That's an even quicker route to getting your insurance cancelled when they inevitably find out.

Anyway i read the rest of the thread and see you're now sorted op. Good luck, as before, i would suggest trying some specialist brokers.

I know nothing about black box insurance but thank you for highlighting this issue; it’s useful to know because my children will be learning to drive in a few short years. Good luck, hope you get it sorted 🤞

very good points. For this reason I will still be avoiding comparison sites just because they have my quote search history which will make things unnecessarily complicated. Will speak to a few high street brokers I think. Always better to have that face to face conversation.

Spoke to the company again today and was now told that because they would’ve been willing to reinstate the policy at the time if I’d have gotten in touch, that it doesn’t actually count as a cancellation for the purposes that other companies will ask for. They ask that question because they want to know if I’ve been ‘dumped’ by another company, which isn’t what happened.

Get this in writing from them too.

Reply and ask categorically whether your insurance was cancelled; and is declarable as so.

They should reiterate that it is not.

Guard that email and buy insurance as normal.

Can they test anything to show it wasn't turned off? I suspect they'd want you to pay, as there's no real interest for them.

Do not drive without insurance.

There's 1,000's of ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) cameras around and they're on all traffic and firearms police cars (marked and unmarked). About 2 months after the insurance ends, they go on the system. As soon as you go through one of those cameras, it'll flag up and alert one copper who has the ANPR activated on they're computer / tablet / mobile phone / in car system (traffic / firearms). Its 6 points for no insurance, which having a licence less than 2 years, you'll be banned.

You might have to look at going back on parents policy and blame you dad for not taking you out and that's what's caused all of this. Until a couple of years have passed.

The advice about the ombudsman is good advice, though to start with you will need to go back to the original insurer and make a complaint. If they don’t uphold the complaint you can then refer the matter to the FOS. It sounds like the cancellation was probably a bit unreasonable and it is certainly not the type of cancellation, that the question you are now having problems with is intended to capture. For now I would expect a good insurance broker to be able to place this insurance for you at reasonable rates

Try and insurance broker. The have a much better result for out of the ordinary cases.

I used to work as an insurance broker, what u wanna do is put the policy in your dads or mums name, or anyone that is a relative who is older. The MID doesn’t really get checked for insurance cancelled. More for points etc. drive a year or 2 with the policy then get your own.

Your insurance cancellation was for an innocent reason so I am sure you will be able to find insurance but you’ll need to do it by phoning a broker such as Adrian flux and going through the full story. Mind you, insurance will still cost a mental amount. My guess is at least 1k for you. Google car insurance young drivers and you’ll find loads of brokers - ie a company that sells insurance for lots of different insurance companies.

Then you should know fronting an insurance policy is illegal 🙄

I havent read all the comments but I argue ( and always win ) complaints with insurance companies all the time.

send a FORMAL COMPLAINT to the insurance company setting out that the car was NOT used and they were incorrect to infer you had turned the box off. Look for evidence of mileage ( like the last MOT ) and current mileage. Ask them to declare they incorrectly cancelled your policy:

If they do not agree, take your compliant to the financial onbudsman. Its free and you have nothing to lose

OMG !! Like OMG - this is such bad and ILLEGAL advice 🤬🤬

Not really? Fully legal! Loopholes are everywhere. Just need to find them! Law abiding citizens and straight and square people always paying for other people’s mistakes! Rise up and take a stand!!

What?!

As has already been said upthread… it’s called fronting and it’s illegal.

I am pretty sure that if you worked as an insurance broker, you’d know it’s a criminal offence and that the OP could end up with points on her licence, losing her licence, and/or a criminal record… not to mention never being able to get insurance again after committing insurance fraud…

https://www.wearemarmalade.co.uk/contact-us/black-box-insurance
try marmalade. They have a webchat, email and phone number you can call to see if they can help. They are specifically there for learners and the younger driver insurance. They may be able to offer you some good advice. Hope you get sorted

Is the reason you don't work for a broker any more because you're happy to recommend insurance fraud as a solution to high premiums? 🤔

This does not make sense to me. 1. Did you have a black box as a learner driver. 2. Did the insurance say you had to drive every week or your insurance would be cancelled. We used marmalade insurance when dd was learning, no black box. Passed test in August 2021, got car and insurance in the October. Had black box app on phone, not a physical black box, and info from app sent to insurer. When passenger in car she had to let app know she was not the driver, and she let them know she would not be driving for a few months when she was away to Europe. Is it possible that they assumed, that when you were not actually driving you had somehow switched off the box. This would be very unfair, if they assumed you were driving with out the box therefore null and voiding your insurance. And this was not actually the case. you were just not driving as you had no one to take you out. It might be worth clarifying this. It just seems very unfair. And to always have it on your record.

Surely your MOT records would have shown the insuance company you hadn't been using the car as the recorded millage wouldn't have changed. For the record you can still obtain this records so going back to them with this evidence my surfice and remove the mark on your record.

Hope you get it sorted

I'm not familiar with learners insurance, was the policy in your name or were you a named driver?