Many car and bike owners spend hundreds of pounds each year more than they need to, because they don’t shop around.
Loyalty costs you money – insurers don’t reward this any more, but see existing customers as where their profit comes from. They lose money on new customers who are given cheaper deals to entice them over in the first place.
The good news is that comparing car insurance is simple and easy and you can find the best price in less than five minutes. You can then compare the quality of the policy and have a idea of the best price to negotiate with your existing insurer, if you want to stay put.
There are a handful of ways to help reduce your car insurance costs and we’ve listed our favourite tricks.
1. Shop around for the best insurance
Use an online comparison service to do the hard work for you. Put in your details and check the prices that come up. You can alter the excess that you are willing to pay and the mileage you will drive and get new quotes.
Be careful though. When shopping around for car insurance, it’s important to make sure that you are comparing like-for-like cover. Some policies may seem cheaper, but you may find you don’t have the same level of cover when you have to make a claim.
Some comparison services give you better results than others. Our favourites are MoneySupermarket and Confused.com.
2. Protect your No Claims Bonus
A long No Claims Bonus is the single best way of cutting car insurance costs, so protect it.
This may increase the premium by a few pounds, but this fades into insignificance against the potential loss of a 90 per cent discount on a premium of several hundred pounds.
3. Make your car safer
Fitting an approved alarm, immobiliser or tracking device can give you a discount of around 5-10%. Many new cars come with a good alarm these as standard, so make sure you find out which one you have and let your insurer know.
4. Be a better driver
Blackbox policies reward those people who drive carefully. The insurer will install a system in your car to monitor your driving which checks your speed, how aggressive your acceleration and braking is and how cautiously you drive.
It can also tell whether you are on the road at so-called “dangerous times” – for example, the early hours of the morning.
Telematics can cut premiums substantially once you start to prove you are a good driver. The best use of these is for those drivers whose premiums are high, particularly young drivers.
Some insurers can even offer an up front discount if you take out such a policy.
5. Do your research!
There are many informative websites out there who have looked into this problem before and can offer advice for all situations. Read up before you get your credit card out.
