Don't like the adverts?  Click here to remove them

UK Insurance Ballpark Figures for City Dwellers?

stuzbot

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 20, 2021
Messages
469
Just wondering what kind of ballpark figures those of you who, like me, have the misfortune to live in UK cities are getting?

I've not even got myself a Land Cruiser [Colorado / Prado] yet. But I've been putting a potential scenarios into a couple of comparison sites and the figures I'm getting back are eye-watering. If that's the best I can hope to get, there's no way I can afford to run a Land Cruiser. For comparison; my last 3 motors have been VW vans dating from mid 90s with declared value ~ £5000 and my premiums have bounced around the £350 mark. That's living in city centre Manchester. Motors kept in locked compound.

I've been putting similar figures into the comparison sites; late 90s Colorado/Prado similar declared value and the figures I'm getting back are ranging from £900 to over £2000. I'm mid fifties, clean licence held for 25+ years and 9 years no claims. Even bumping up my voluntary excess to a grand doesn't help.

I knew that, if I wanted to get a Land Cruiser, Id be moving up a few notches on the insurance groups, so was expecting to maybe pay an extra hundred or two a year. But these figures I'm getting back are like some teenager would get, trying to insure his first boy racer hatchback. Surely there must be something better out there for an old fart like me!
 
The mrs premium more than doubled when she swapped cars for 4x4 despite not a single claim in 30 odd years , i think it came down again in consecutive years and is now a little under £500 . Hers is a 2001 90 though I haven't held a driving licence nearly as long as her and both my 80 series and my 1998 90 series are i think closer to 400 .

100,000 people in this town i think so not rural at all .

Adrian Flux
 
The mrs premium more than doubled when she swapped cars for 4x4 despite not a single claim in 30 odd years..

I wonder if this is a recent development? Prior to my decade or so driving old VW vans, as mentioned above, I had several old Series LandRovers, a Nissan Patrol and an Isuzu Trooper. I never had any problems getting those insured for the same kind of sum as any other vehicle I'd owned. And that would have been 10 -20 years ago, when I was a much less experienced driver. In fact, if anything, the premiums were lower because the vehicles were so old and had low declared values.

BTW: I had a bad experience with Adrian Flux, insuring one of my campers a few years back. Wouldn't touch them with a bargepole, after that.
 
Thing is Flux seem to recognize an old cruiser is something much more than a car and modifications are expected rather than frowned upon . I bumped someone recently and when they called it was a pleasant chat i said my fault entirely and there's nothing to fix on my 80 . Can only wait and see what it will cost next year .

Hastings had my daughters Fiesta at 50 a month for a 30 year old couple with two years no claims so 600 . She wrote it off and after much ado claimed 1200 back , now they want 96 a month for pretty much the same car .
 
Flux seem to be the Marmite of insurance companies. It seems, for every person giving them the thumbs up, there's another one recounting a horror story. My own personal opinion of them is definitely of the thumbs down variety:

A few years back, I insured my self-build camper wagon with them. They took all the details, I paid the premium and then, a few days later, I got an email off them saying they wanted an engineer's report for my camper, seeing as it was a self-build. Even though I'd told them this when I enquired about insuring it and they even had a menu option for 'Self Build' on the 'model' drop down on their website.

So I told them to cancel the policy, seeing as they were changing the terms after I'd already taken it out and they took something ridiculous like £90 off me for 'admin fees' and the 3 or 4 days I'd been insured with them.

From what I've read of other people's experiences with them, that seems to be their modus operandi. They'll quote you a good price, but then either try and shaft you at renewal time, or use some other backhanded method to rip you off. Their business model seems to be based on the 'Fool me once' principle.
 
Try the NFU ...they don't do comparison sites ....
They are now insuring most of our risks and admittedly we are rural but they have a brilliant local office where you can ( or used to until covid ) go and sit down over a brew and discuss your requirements .
I've been on the other side of the NFU dealing with customers who are insured with them and making claims ...they have always been fair and paid out...one case customer was claiming for a broken axle on a tractor that was clearly lack of maintenance..... the assessor looked at the damage and agreed with me that it was not accidental damage .... he then told the customer he would however pay for both the damaged doors on the tractor cab.... these were in the region of £1400 each and the customer had only mentioned them in passing ....
 
Don't like the adverts?  Click here to remove them
I've heard good things about NFU --at least insofar as processing claims, etc. goes. Although most people say they're a bit dearer than other companies. I thought they only insured rural folks though? I'll check them out anyway.

RANDOM THOUGHT: Does anyone know if the insurance comparison sites do any kind of lookup [eg. electoral register] on the details you supply? I've been using a made up name and disposable email address when getting quotes, so I don't get bombarded with spam. But now I'm wondering whether they might be checking whether or not 'Johnny Fartpants' really is on the electoral register at this address!

<a few mins later...>

I'll answer my own question here:

The answer seems to be "possibly". I've just put my real name in and the quotes have come down slightly. Lowest one is now £557 with a black box fitted [F**k that!] or £833 without. Still 3 times what I've been paying up til now on similarly vintage vehicles. But does give me some slight hope that I might be able to shave this down a bit, if I shop around.
 
Last edited:
They do so if you have neighbours who claim 3 times a year you get stung for it . Long time ago i looked into this and found a news story on how insurance is a location risk factor lottery inevitably showing the poorer areas pay more .
 
Not the same story but i'm sure its an issue thats been wrote about many times .

Hows this for irony , the mrs did exactly what i did to lose my no claims a couple of months ago to a neighbour who lives in the same street just last week :angry-screaming: but guess what his attitude is its just a car and i know you can fix it :icon-surprised: when i went to get the keys it turns out his wife is an insurance claim assessor :icon-eek:

It polished up great and when he gets home today i will fit a new wing mirror and because he was a gentleman about it seeing what i can do with rattlecan and polisher to tidy up the scratches on the other side left by someone who drove away .

I bet thats a £1200 claim and a several hundred pound premium hike all avoided with a bit of goodwill and 80 quid .
 
Last edited:
I reckon it has to be your postcode. I'm in a similar situation to you: inner London location, clean licence & claims record, locked garage overnight. NFU won't touch me because its Urban. £239 this year from Privilege, part of the Direct Line group. Try putting in a rural postcode and see what happens.
 
£239 this year from Privilege, part of the Direct Line group...


£239 sounds pretty good to me. My mental block with insurance comes in at around £365. Below that I can think of it as less than a quid a day and it doesn't seem so bad. Cheapest I've got so far by sacrificing my real name and contact details to the comparison sites, and doubtless setting myself up for spam from now til doomsday, was £701 from Admiral. That's for me + the missus as a named driver, on her provisional licence.
 
There's your answer I didn't have a licence when i bought my first 90 i just see it and thought i'm having that . The mrs insisted it was insured to drive home which cost me about 1200 . That halved when i passed my test on a 2 day crash course a couple of weeks later .

Take her off it , get your quote and then ask if it would be ok to give the mrs driving lessons .
 
OK, that's the reason. They all jack up the premiums for insuring a provisional licence holder, it's not just the postcode. Just to satisfy yourself about that do the search again with your wife as same length clean licence as you.
 
I tried both with and without the missus on there. Adding her only put another ~ £90 onto the quote. So not that much of a difference, really

The odd thing is, she's had her provisional licence for 21 years. She got it when she was younger so she could ride a 125 and she has a wee scooter now. But she's never had a car so never needed to take a driving test. I wonder if that's considered good? [as in has held a provisional licence for 20+ years] or bad? [as in has held a provisional licence for 20+ years but never passed a driving test]
 
Mate of mine has ridden and drove trikes for decades on a provisional licence but this year they put his business in jeopardy by refusing to renew because it is written into legislation there must be some effort to qualify . Who might have guessed huh , poor bugger runs back and forth all day in his robin reliant to ensure the cooked fish he sells is as fresh as it can be .
 
...it is written into legislation there must be some effort to qualify...

Yeah. You have to retake the CBT after 12 months, if you've not passed your full test in that time. I think what a lot of moped delivery people do is just keep doing their CBT over and over again, every year.
 
Yeah hes in the Isle of Man where you buy a provisional at the post office when your 16 and actually start thinking about a driving or motorbike licence if your still alive when your 21 .

Same highway code and all that they just adopt what laws they want not those they don't and then they only apply to some people but not others , all depends on who your bum chums are .
 
Last edited:
Stuzbot give Graham Sykes a call know everybody is different but I'm on a modified policy ageed value of 8500 and 7000 miles for private use only and classed as retired and fully comp and protected at the moment pay 235 if you are using it for commuting for work then the risk rises you will have to reduce the risk but reckon 5 to 600 ain't bad for a city dweller or maybe a bit more expensive and extreme move house opposite your workplace
 
Try a Mayfair London address and i bet it costs less than a fiver
 
Back
Top