To share my newly discovered knowledge of how to save money on your car insurance?

[apostrophewoman]

I know this isn’t an AIBU, but I’ve been driving for 38 years and only discovered this from the Martin Lewis website email I had yesterday.

Theres a link on Martin Lewis to fill your details in on Money Supermarket and it points out sections where you can make changes to reduce your quote.

For instance, my job isn’t on the list but I’ve always chosen ‘Admin’ which covers it. By choosing a different job title, while still remaining appropriate to your job, you can save all sorts of different percentages - the drop down list will tell you.

Im also feeling a bit stupid that I’ve always put in my mileage per year as my full mileage, but again, it will tell that work commute mileage doesn’t count, and in many cases your figure should also not include shopping or visiting family and friends!

So I’ve legitimately halved my mileage and changed my job description and saved about forty quid on my quotes - maybe not life changing but it’s my forty quid!

So this is not unreasonable but hopefully helpful!

Another tip is to do your car insurance way before it's due. We put our new one in place in January but it doesn't need renewing until April. The closer to the renewal date, the more expensive it gets.

I just looked at the Money Saving expert site. It says quite clearly for 'personal use'
Wondering how to work this out?
We're after the number of miles you think your car will do over the next year.
Working out the number of miles your car’s done this year is probably a good starting point. Think about how many miles you usually drive per day or per week, then multiply it up to get a yearly figure. Add in any longer trips, such as visits, weekends away or holidays.

@apostrophewoman You have mainly misunderstood what you were being asked. If you had answered the question before that one, and selected another option (such as business use) then there would have been TWO questions about the mileage - one for Personal miles and one for business miles

The bit you are correct about is how you list your occupation, but that still needs to be a reasonable description of what you do.

I have reported this as 'misinformation' as have others. Please ask MN to take this down, and maybe rewrite it once you've understood. You MUST declare total annual mileage. Work it from your car's current milometer reading and its age, or MOT or service and maintenance history. Then you have to make sure commuting and business miles are covered if necessary. You may have to estimate what proportion of the total these are.

That is what I have been told by several insurance companies. If you go to a different office than your usual one, that counts as business use so you need the business cover. Mileage either has to be business or personal when you tell insurance companies your annual mileage. Some separate it out but some just want your annual total.

@Swiftie1878 even delaying by a single day can knock £££ off the quote. My DS passed his test at lunchtime Thursday end Jan. Saved £300 by starting his insurance the following day, rather than same day.

Also went with telematics tracker option (uses an app on their phone, with a widget thing that sits in the car, but isn't wired in). It monitors speed, braking, acceleration, cornering and phone usage, and gives them a score that they can monitor and work on improving over the year. Next year's insurance quote then impacted by the score for the year. Crucially for us it doesn't restrict what times he can drive, as have heard some policies don't allow them to drive at night and that wouldn't work with his part-time job. Very basic, small car (old 107), and added myself and his dad to bring the policy down. Still cost c£1k, but a lot less than some have paid.

That's badly written and could be misunderstood.
Of course all those things are counted toward total mileage.

Absolutely inadequate. Following OP's mistaken mileage advice is fraudulent. It could get policies voided, cover rescinded, payouts refused and future insurance premiums rocketed as a known fraudster. Relying on people to RTFT to realise this is irresponsible. Take down this thread.

You have misunderstood what this sentence means. I agree that it is a biy ambiguous though.

It means you do your commuting, shopping, visits, etc then add up the mileage these take. It doesn't mean you disregard them.

Hi all,
Thanks to all of those who have reported and challenged what appears to be erroneous information. MNers are only human and can make mistakes, especially when wording is unclear, but we think that anyone reading the thread would not labour under any misapprehension for long.
As it contains other information and has overall been a good discussion, we would be inclined to let it stay for other tips. (Especially for those of us who may have teenage drivers to insure!)

I've previously seen Mumsnet HQ put some sort of disclaimer or "content warning" at the beginning of a thread to warn readers that the OP is making a claim that is incorrect or untrue or misleading etc.

Can't they do the same here? The OP is dangerously misleading.

I'd do it myself but don't know how to report something...

With who out of interest? As you can’t get quotes on any comparison site more than 30 days in advance.

This thread is an excellent example of the dangers of buying a product like insurance online or through a comparison website where the consumer might not fully understand all the nuances of the questions they are answering.

I always buy insurance by 'phone (perhaps after looking at comparison sites) so I can clarify with a human being exactly what certain questions mean.

The other thing users of comparison sites need to know is that your visits to them and the answers you give to different questions are recorded. If your history shows you trying out different answers to questions in order to engineer a lower premium you are likely to have your behaviour flagged as suspicious and might end up invalidating your insurance

@apostrophewoman so you are right commuting figures are not personal figures and if you only just have SD&P insurance the figure is right.

If you commute AT ALL you need to include commuting mileage as part of the insurance policy then add those figures on top of the personal mileage

do you commute OP and have you added the commuting mileage and insurance to the policy?

This is ridiculous. The entire first post is wrong and contains incorrect information that could lead to a reader underestimating their mileage and invalidating an insurance claim. But you think that's ok as people will read on? What about those that don't. We've had people four pages in thanking the op for their advice! They clearly didn't read beyond the first post.
Considering the stuff that does get deleted, this is an awful response!

Erm what??? All mileage counts!

I've found the best way to reduce my insurance is to get older and to always shop around.

Things like saying it is parked on the road rather than a drive don't make any difference to my quotes.

I'm aware that insurers are no longer able to discriminate on the basis of sex since a european judgment 15 or so years ago, but does the industry still refer to "gender" as opposed to "sex"?

I ask because of course in the UK there is no such protected characteristic under the Equality Act as "gender", the relevant protected characteristic being "sex".

Not getting at you personally but it's often very confusing and misleading when the two terms are mistakenly used as being synonymous or when references are made to "gender" when what is meant - or in the UK at least should be meant - is "sex".

Noooo. Op it isn't the 'mileage less miles travelled for shopping' etc.!!!!! It means the miles you travel for every day tasks!!!! It's poor wording, but it is giving examples of what personal mileage would be... It includes travelling for shopping, commuting etc!!!!!!

But can't some sort of warning be added to the beginning of the thread that what the OP says that commuting, shopping and "personal" mileage should not be included in your total mileage is blatantly wrong?

Anyone following that advice could have their insurance cancelled with far reaching financial consequences for as long as they want to buy insurance.

Not to point out that the advice is wrong is irresponsible. It doesn't matter that other info in the thread is useful and correct. The OP is wrong!

This.

Some actual legitimate ways to get a cheaper premium:

• Adjusting mileage on renewal only if it’s truthful, as opposed to blindly accepting your renewal quote based on what you estimated previously. For example when I took my first policy out I googled what an average driver does in a year and it said 8000 so I went with that. I then proceeded to only do 2k miles over that year, so adjusted to 5k when my renewal came up as no change to circumstances meant it was likely to be the same and also left me some wiggle room.

• Adjusting job title so long as it still accurately represents what you do. I.e kitchen worker instead of chef = fine, librarian instead of race car driver = not fine

• Adding someone with a long clean driving history as a named driver

• Increasing your voluntary excess - obviously you need to be realistic about what you could actually afford should the worst happen, but if paying £500 instead of £100 excess wouldn’t put you into financial difficulty if you did need to pay it, this can bring the premium down.

• Buying the policy 20-29 days in advance of when you need it to start. Waiting until right before can throw up “you’re desperate and therefore will likely pay anything we ask” quotes

• Black boxes for new drivers

• Buying third party only cover. I actually would not recommend this, as only the third party damages would be paid and not your own. However, for someone that drives a dinger that is only worth a couple hundred quid that they’re not that bothered about, it is the minimum level of cover you can get that keeps you legally on the road.

• Taking off “extras” such as courtesy car, key cover, windscreen cover, breakdown cover etc. I take the breakdown cover off as I already get this through my bank. I keep the others on but, again, others might have different circumstances and not feel the need.

Another strategy, particularly if you are older is to put another naned driver on your policy ... my father in law out me on his insurance abd priced reduced!

Thank you. I have and will take on board the useful bits!

I think OP has misunderstood. I know think they meant to mislead.

It doesn't "appear to be erroneous", it is erroneous and anyone following the advice in the opening post opens them up to accusations of insurance fraud. It is downright negligent to let that post stand, as many have posted. Furthermore, the OP seems to have disappeared. For those reasons it meets MNs own criteria for reporting/deleting.

Bizarre to for MN to let it stand, IMO. I suspect that the moderators don't actually understand the subject matter, or the consequences of misleading an insurer...

When my ds2 got his 1st car insurance 18m ago we had £250 differences in identical information quotes from the same insurer generated within an hour (numerous quotes between £1,150 - £1,400)

Refreshing the quote changed the price, up and down, without ANY change in the information.

No transparency at all.