Just a reminder to never auto renew your insurance

[lornathewizzard]

Got renewal in for my car this week, a few £ cheaper a month, that's odd I thought! Figured that some of DHs points must've expired.

Did my usual comparison on Go Compare, switched and will save £9 a month, about 1/3 off current price. And even the same provider was £5 cheaper a month than the renewal quote they gave us.

Yup. Not only was ours automatically renewed after dp cancelled it! It was more even though he was classed as a new driver last year and hasn't had any claims. Found it half price somewhere else.

Mtpaetku it's ok I switched before it renewed

My insurer proposed a price to auto renew, I found much cheaper with another company, told my insurers and they matched it. If you don't ask, you don't get

I totally agree OP. My car insurance renewal quote came through 2 weeks ago, last year I let it continue but this year the premium increased by £60 so I decided enough was enough! I’m now insured with another company for £130 cheaper and the excess is £100 lower. My insurers reply when I rang to cancel the renewal? We always recommend our customers check elsewhere. No thanks for loyalty anymore.

I just camcelled my house insurance - they wanted £52 pcm on auto renew for buildings and contents. I found similar insurance for £22 pcm online.

By auto renewal do you mean an ongoing direct debit?

You should use a comparison site for all insurance and utilities every year regardless of how you pay for them.

It amazes me that with all the adverts and Martin Lewis never shutting up about it that there's anyone who doesn't know that.

I know that some people can't be bothered as it does take time but there's no excuse for not being aware of comparison sites

Yes I mean not to let it renew automatically at renewal time, however you pay

Quite right too. But are you actually paying monthly? The interest rate will be massive. Please try to save to avoid this.

I’ve let mine continue twice now because it was still the cheapest. I did check first though.

I don't understand why our auto renewal is always so much more expensive (hundreds more) but then we do an online comparison and get a much cheaper quote... with the same company! It just feels really underhand.

It is. They are relying on disorganisation.

Totally agree! My renewal letter came through and my insurance is to go up £30 a MONTH! For the exact same cover but £360 more for the year. I think not! Will be phoning to cancel after going through a comparison quote and getting prices £20 cheaper a month than what I was paying for this last year.

Insurance companies are my pet hate!

Mine gets cheaper every year with existing insurer & much more expensive with any other. Have a feeling I'm somehow atypical.

I'm with Admiral, and every year we have the dance of them sending me a totally uncompetitive renewal quote, me going online to get better ones (often including a much better one from them), phoning them up and them agreeing to match. I mean, it's nice to always get a good price without having to switch insurer, but I do wish we could skip the intermediate steps :)

I shopped around for pet insurance this year after many years of auto renewal and reduced my cost by over 50%

Absolutely agree, I never auto renew any policies. It’s so easy online to look around for better deals.

I remember the days of sitting down with the phone and the Yellow Pages ringing round brokers for quotes, jeez that was a tiresome task!

I also do the “are you going to offer me a competitive price or am I going to walk?” two-step every year with sodding Admiral. I wouldn’t mind so much except that they always make me spend half an hour going through every single bloody question on the form again in a transparent pretence that that’s why they’re cutting the price. One year I swear I’m going to ring up and say “None of my details have changed. I want to pay 400 quid for the same cover. You have five minutes to offer me that price or I’m off.”

Unfortunately a lot of insurance companies auto renew as standard and it is becoming harder and harder to avoid them. Even If you can cancel the auto renewal with them when you apply, I always make sure I phone up a couple of weeks before renewal is due to make sure it has definitely been cancelled (I always pay for things annually).
I very rarely stay with the same company, not unless there is only about £20 in it.

I just came on here to say how annoyed I am with Direct Line. I put my dd on my insurance just after she turned 17 (as in a week or so after), giving them her date of birth. They then phoned my several times while I was at work (I don't answer my phone when I'm with students or in meetings, so most of the day) and when I finally called back it was to ask how long she had held a provisional licence. The woman did have the good grace to laugh when I pointed out the date of birth.

Now they have written me a letter saying that they don't think I am the registered keeper of the car (I'm not), more or less accusing me of lying. All good, except that on the Insurance Schedule it clearly states that I am not the owner or registered keeper. A long and rather bad tempered conversation later, full of me asking "can you state exactly what information you need" and them saying "no" in about 5000 words and they almost (but not quite) admitted they were wrong. I will definitely be shopping round next time.

The annoying thing is that after the first contact to change the policy I gave them great feedback because the woman was really nice on the phone, it turns our she was also incompetent.

Outside that's exactly what I do. I've been with my insurance company a few years running now because I got a good deal initially, then the next year the auto renewal was actually competitive enough for me to stay with them.

Last year the auto renewal was about £100 more than I was happy to pay, so I simply rang them and told them the maximum I wanted to pay. They were fine with that and threw in a good deal on breakdown cover at the same time for a few extra quid, it was all sorted in minutes.

It's always worth paying annually instead of monthly though if you can, you get a much better deal.

I went with Sheilas wheels this year for buildings and contents ins. They weren't the cheapest but I wanted to go with a company I had actually heard of and they were still massively cheaper than my old ins co, who told me that everyone is competitive for the first yr and then the price will rise to a more realistic level.
The way I see it though, is that even if they jump up next yr, it wont be by £300, so will still be cheaper than my piss taking previous ins company!

Have resigned myself to going through this process every year though.

Speaking of cutting costs I finally did what martin lewis said and phoned sky, threatening to leave - got £24 per month off the bill! Am cross I didn't do it earlier.

My renewal came through the other day as £1200! It was £700 last year. I think there must have been a lot of car crime in my area last year as the cheapest I could get was £750. I thought it was supposed to get cheaper each year as I gained more years accident free driving experience (I've had my licence for 5 years).

Mother yes, I’ll be moving my breakdown cover and holiday insurance when they come up for renewal. Customer loyalty means nothing to them. They sent me another questionnaire to fill in, luckily, so I gave them a lot of detail as to why they were scoring 0/10. Therapeutic. Told them I would only be renewing the car insurance if hell actually had frozen over.