Car insurance

[watervole]

 When I got my car insurance renewal from ASDA, it was £1869 (and they could no longer include breakdown cover in that as the car was getting older).

Thank goodness I shopped around.  My new premium is under £800 and includes RAC Roadside.  And my new insurer has a telephone number.  ASDA used to stress me out terribly as you could only communicate by email - and they didn't always reply even then.  Most things had to be done by logging onto the policy and manually editing it to change anything (like a new driver) and I just hated it.

I'm now with IGO4, via Moneysupermarket.com

If that sounds like a bit of an advert, I guess it is.  Saving £1000 means a lot to us at the moment.  And having an insurer where I can also speak to a human being (I phoned up to ask a question about one part of the policy and had an instant helpful answer) is important to me.

Comments

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

I remember that, when my mother was insuring her car for me to drive, we had to be very careful about my job description. "Journalist" evidently signalled "dangerous drink driver" and attracted a very high premium. When I worked on Computer Weekly, my colleagues found out that "technical writer" was the safest gambit, but that didn't quite apply to me. I think we discovered that "editor" was somehow more respectable than "journalist" (rather than indicating someone at the top of the drink chain).

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Heh, I got stung by the Indian High Commission insisting I paid for a work visa rather than a tourist one, after I put my job down as "Editor". Although I pointed out I was an editor of economic textbooks rather than the Daily Telegraph, they insisted that I might be going to Commit Journalism while out there on holiday.

[auntygillian.livejournal.com]

That confirms a similar experience I had: I usually describe myself as a publishing consultant or commissioning editor, and there's always a long pause while they search through the tick lists trying to find something to match. I was once refused insurance after that question/answer - no explanation - and on another occasion they did ask 'is that for newspapers?' so I did twig that journalism was bad. I too now say 'Editor'.