insurance ...are we that different to the UK??

jon1981

How come insurance in the UK is broken down into groups and here its an individual quotation per person? am i right in thinking that in the UK if your car falls into a group 5 (for example) insurance quote that you pay that regardless of age or experience?

Are the accident statistics that worse off here than the UK that Insurance companies have to charge these huge premiums?

Why can't the government force insurance companies to regulate their premiums?

keefg

The "Group" that your call falls into is only part of the calculation of the total premium.

Age & Exp and where you live is still a factor. Talking to a friend of mine in London recently, it seems that ins premiums in the UK have gone up over the last 5 years or so where the premiums in Ireland have steadily come down (for over 25's anyway)

Seems like the gap ins cost (UK = LOW & IRE = HIGH) is closing. Maybe due to increased competition and even the peno points introduction may have something to do with it.

layke

Well for a start the Gov don't want people using cars. They want to try and persuede people to use public transport so it's not really in their best interest to try and lower insurance.

In the UK the claims are different I believe you get less over there (or so it used to be) therefore they pay a lower premium.

Finally I would also say it's down to competition. Unfortunately Ireland does not have the population to warrent other countries like Germany or the Uk to setup shop here. I'd be interested to see who owns each insurance company. I would guess that one company would own a few others so when you call up they all know you've been ringing around.

Quint

Car and motorcycle drivers get totally shafted by insurance companies here. All you can do is bend over and spread your cheeks

Wishbone Ash

Personal injury awards are much, much higher in Ireland. Lose an eye in the Britain and you'd probably get £5,000, lose one here and it would be more like €250,000.

Anan1

Quint wrote:

Car and motorcycle drivers get totally shafted by insurance companies here. All you can do is bend over and spread your cheeks

I can't say for the market in general, but i'm quite happy with the amount i've been paying in recent years.

Quint

Go to an english site and type in your details to get an online quote and seeif it's any cheaper. Mine was 10 times cheaper for better cover!

Anan1

Quint wrote:

Go to an english site and type in your details to get an online quote and seeif it's any cheaper. Mine was 10 times cheaper for better cover!

Sounds like you're paying a lot more than me! Maybe it's your age? Post up the URL of the UK site you used and i'll give it a go.

Quint

It was for bike insurance and I'm 30. 7 years no claims (think 5 is the max), i went to www.ebikeinsurance.co.uk and was quoted £150 for fully comp. Here i pay €980 for 3rd party only, can't get a quote for theft!

Anan1

Have a link for car insurance? I know nothing about bike insurance, but I wouldn't have thought my car insurance would be much less (if any less) in the UK.

Quint

Vice versa for me! Just googled and got:
http://www.quotelinedirect.co.uk/
http://www.theinsurancecentre.co.uk/
You'll probably need a postcode, i'm using NR7 8EW which is a place on the outskirts of Norwich. Complete random one!

Quint

£257 for fully comp with the insurance center! not bad at all, i'd take someone's arm off for a quote here, even if it was double that!

Anan1

Quint wrote:

£257 for fully comp with the insurance center! not bad at all, i'd take someone's arm off for a quote here, even if it was double that!

It's not liking that postcode, what street address did you put in?

ambro25

With first hand experience of both, with the same car (UK ins. while on UK plates, IE ins. while on IE plates), I can vouch that the UK is on average at least half of IE.

Same circumstances and details (save for addresses obviously), fully-comp with NCB protection, registered owner as main driver plus one named driver, both with 15+ years of full driver license and max NCB.

Comparison since Feb.2004, and still valid to this day.

Now, if you're talking about continental insurance... Still the same car, but now stored/ins. in France, insured in FR (still on IE plates) still fully comp., for less than 20% of the last IE premium. How d'you like them apples?

Now, @ OP

jon1981 wrote:

Are the accident statistics that worse off here than the UK that Insurance companies have to charge these huge premiums?

I really don't think so - notwithstanding the fact that it's a captive market, with all the potential for oligopolistic practices that entails, it's very much more a case of too much of the Irish market wrongly conforming to:

Anan1 wrote:

I can't say for the market in general, but i'm quite happy with the amount i've been paying in recent years.

[Note - this is not saying that Anan1's insurance is not competitive, but just to illustrate my point that people don't appear to be shopping around much. Say, like shopping around for banking, electricity, or phone providers, or...]

Anan1

I'm still not convinced. For example, i'm paying €596 fully comp with fully protected bonus, open driving over 25 and my g/f on a provisional as a named driver on a 99 Audi A8 4.2 quattro, insured for €20k. Would insurance in the UK really be much cheaper? Based on what i've read, I don't get the impression that it would. Given our higher accident levels & insurance payouts, the above premium doesn't strike me as unreasonable.

pow wow

It's also worth mentioning in the UK they enforce the accompanying driver rule with learners a lot more than they do here, in theory improving road safety. The sheer numbers who insure cars also have a lot to do with the premium v claims pot and there is hefty competition.

My insurance (provisional licence) is around the same here as it was when I lived there...though I lived in a baaaaaad postcode.

ambro25

The issue, is that it's pointless banging in real details in a UK online quote calculator with a made up address/postcode, because a goodly portion of the UK premium actually depends on the postcode.

It's one of the main factors against which claims are aggregated by: in the UK, it's not so much what you drive (because of car insurance "Groups"), than where you live (how many claims in the neighborhood over the years) and what you do (how much will a solicitor miss an eye, versus a police marksman - e.g.).

EDIT - 'tis a good premium for IE, Anan1.

EDIT 2 - just noticed ellscurr involuntarily confirming my point above (with thx).

Anan1

Now i'm lost. You're saying that insurance here is more expensive than in the UK because of my attitude, despite the fact that I am paying no more (I think) than I would in the UK but you are? ;-)

pow wow

ambro25 wrote:

The issue, is that it's pointless banging in real details in a UK online quote calculator with a made up address/postcode, because a goodly portion of the UK premium actually depends on the postcode.

It's one of the main factors against which claims are aggregated by: in the UK, it's not so much what you drive (because of car insurance "Groups"), than where you live (how many claims in the neighborhood over the years) and what you do (how much will a solicitor miss an eye, versus a police marksman - e.g.).

EDIT - 'tis a good premium for IE, Anan1.

EDIT 2 - just noticed ellscurr involuntarily confirming my point above (with thx).

I was an insurance broker in the UK...and kept my postcode rating manual when I left lol. My postcode was the second to worst group in the country!

ambro25

@ Anan1
No - I quoted you out-of-context, to illustrate a point (which is why I added the disclaimer). It's your words, but used to illustrate a point which does not apply to you.

Anan1

ambro25 wrote:

@ Anan1
No - I quoted you out-of-context, to illustrate a point (which is why I added the disclaimer). It's your words, but used to illustrate a point which does not apply to you.

You're probably correct when you say that most people here don't shop around for insurance. But i'm not convinced that the resultant over-the-top premiums being paid by some here can be used to argue that our premiums are twice those in the UK.

ambro25

Anan1 wrote:

You're probably correct when you say that most people here don't shop around for insurance. But i'm not convinced that the resultant over-the-top premiums being paid by some here can be used to argue that our premiums are twice those in the UK.

That was not my argument (nor did I postulate one), just a recounting of first-hand experience. I believe it's somewhat representative, not authoritative.

If I was ging to postulate an argument, it would be (simply) that IE insurance is much more expensive than UK insurance, and a contributing factor is the fact that people don't shop around enough, thusly don't entice inter-insurers competition.

rowanh

Who are you insured with anan1? That seems very cheap. I would agree though that insurance prices here are not so bad anymore. Im 26 and while some cars might be around 2k for me to be insured on they would be in the highest bracket of cars in the uk and fiarly expensive to insure there too. My insurance is up for renewal in october and on quinn directs website any car that they will give me a quote for comes up at 700 euro.


Does anyone know of an insurance company called something like arg or arb? I heard somewhere people were paying very little on performance cars with them but i couldnt find any contact details for them and now i have forgotten what exactly they are called.

Rovi

rowanh wrote:

Does anyone know of an insurance company called something like arg or arb? I heard somewhere people were paying very little on performance cars with them but i couldnt find any contact details for them and now i have forgotten what exactly they are called.

ARB Underwriting Ltd

rowanh

Rovi wrote:

ARB Underwriting Ltd

thanks

unkel

As Wishbone Ash mentioned, it's all to do with personal injury awards. Why the premium is relatively reasonable for some and not for others is the likelyhood of causing an accident resulting in a claim for personal injury

If an insurance company reckons it is very unlikely that someone will cause an expensive accident, premiums are reasonable enough

Examples: men like Anan1 who have a very long no claims history or >30 year old women, even if they've only a provisional license

If an insurance company reckons it is quite likely that someone will cause an expensive accident, premiums shoot through the roof, or quotes are even refused

Examples: all very young male drivers, esp. with certain cars, esp. on a learner license. The premiums don't go down substantially until the driving test is passed and a few years NCB are built up

Anan1

rowanh - I'm insured with FBD. They didn't initially want to go that low, it took a bit of persuasion.