You wonder why Insurance is dear

[***Mr D***]

Many people do not like paying Insurance, and will complain at the price they pay.

In the near future I feel prices will increase as it has been a soft market recently. and the cost of claims is not reducing.

Back to my original 'You wonder why its dear' title.

Here is a list of the most Fraudulent 'Hot Spots' since 1999 and the number of fraudulent claims.

1. Blackburn - 1710
2. Bradford - 1669
3. Birmingham - 1510
4. Oldham - 1034
5. Bolton - 986
6. Manchester - 979

Now this will have a reflection with some insurers how they treat (rate) the BB postal code area.

So if you have a motor policy expect maybe a little increase from what you paid in 2006.

Now whats you thoughts.

[chav1]

car insurance was a rip off even before the claim trend came to effect

lets face it if it wasnt fraudulant claims they would still put prices up and think of another reason but never admit they are greedy sods who get away with charging what they like because you cant drive without it

fraudulant claims are rife and the favourite one at the moment is to get a car full of friends and slam on infront of an unsuspecting motorist , infact in some cases people are fitting a switch that disengages teh brake lights so that the person behind has even less chance of not hitting them

people found to be doing this should be jailed for endangering lives and commiting fraud

another trick is to have a friend with no claims bonus ram into the back of your car again with every seat occupied in both vehicles by friends who can then all put a claim in


not done it mysef but i do know somone who works for recovery and he tells me a lot about what folk are up to

knowing whats going on and proving whats going on are sadly two seprate things all together so usualy the insurers have to pay up

[lancsdave]

Where does the original information come from ?

The Manchester Evening News reported the following in December;

Manchester, Oldham and Bolton are among the five worst areas in the country for staged car crashes.
The crashes are set up by criminals to target innocent drivers in a `cash for crash' sting.

More than 22,000 fraudulently-staged and induced accidents have happened since 1999 and the practice is spreading, according to figures from the Insurance Fraud Bureau.

Bradford topped the list with 1,669 reported incidents and Birmingham came second, with 1,510, followed by Oldham with 1,034, Bolton with 986, and Manchester 979. The scam was first spotted in the north west, but has now spread to London and the south east.

[***Mr D***]

Originally Posted by chav1

car insurance was a rip off even before the claim trend came to effect

lets face it if it wasnt fraudulant claims they would still put prices up and think of another reason but never admit they are greedy sods who get away with charging what they like because you cant drive without it

IMO Insurance is very good value for money when you need it.

Prices are usually based on stats and insurers sometime operate at a loss on a motor account.

[***Mr D***]

Originally Posted by lancsdave

Where does the original information come from ?

I read an artical in a Insurance Magazine.

Hear is a artical I just found (only a quick search).

http://www.nurs.co.uk/news/articles/...94732154_1.htm

[lancsdave]

Originally Posted by ***Mr D***

I read an artical in a Insurance Magazine.

Hear is a artical I just found (only a quick search).

http://www.nurs.co.uk/news/articles/...94732154_1.htm

I got the info from this site;

http://www.ifig.org/news/

Interesting read and confirms what those of us from the Burnley area knew about a few years ago as to the main culprits.

[Less]

Originally Posted by ***Mr D***

IMO Insurance is very good value for money when you need it.

IMO you perhaps work for some insurance company, you do tend to give a great deal of advice etc, so far as insurance is concerned.

But I must admit, I would rather be sat in a car that my friend had taken the bother to insure than risk something illegal.

[chav1]

all i am saying is that insurance companies are a rip off and get away with it because you have to have it by law

many people pay more for their insurance than what their car is worth and teh excuse given by insurance companies is that its not what you are driving but what you may hit , well excuse me but i dont see many ferraris driving around the place and not all drivers have accidents

considering how many cars are on the road its only a small percentage that have accidents or get stolen so yes insurance companies are on a dead cert winner from the start

when i moved to my new house my insurance jumped up £100 because of my postcode yet the area is no better or worse than my previous home and to top it off the biggest crime around here is burgulary which should not effect my car insurance because obvioulsy if i am been burgled then i aint at home which means my car isnt either and i definatly dont keep my car in teh kitchen


yes everyone should have insurance but insurance companies should be more accountable and more strictly regulated

if insurance companies wernt just out to screw money out of you why do we have to shop around so much rather than stick with the same company , only the other week somone posted that their policy didnt go down infact it had gone up despite no accidents or anything yet another company gave them cheaper , if they think they can get away with it they wont reward you

[chav1]

1 more thing

when somone has a claim their insurance goes up so why does everyone elses insurance have to go up ?

granted if a person has protected no claims then their policy dosnt go up but thats a gamble insurance companies take when they offer no claims protection and its their tough luck if it dosnt pay off but still the cost of teir bad buisness sense gets passed on to innocent motorists

[***Mr D***]

Originally Posted by Less

IMO you perhaps work for some insurance company, you do tend to give a great deal of advice etc, so far as insurance is concerned.

But I must admit, I would rather be sat in a car that my friend had taken the bother to insure than risk something illegal.

I may have dealings with insurance companies.

Originally Posted by chav1

all i am saying is that insurance companies are a rip off and get away with it because you have to have it by law.

many people pay more for their insurance than what their car is worth and teh excuse given by insurance companies is that its not what you are driving but what you may hit , well excuse me but i dont see many ferraris driving around the place and not all drivers have accidents

considering how many cars are on the road its only a small percentage that have accidents or get stolen so yes insurance companies are on a dead cert winner from the start

when i moved to my new house my insurance jumped up £100 because of my postcode yet the area is no better or worse than my previous home and to top it off the biggest crime around here is burgulary which should not effect my car insurance because obvioulsy if i am been burgled then i aint at home which means my car isnt either and i definatly dont keep my car in teh kitchen

yes everyone should have insurance but insurance companies should be more accountable and more strictly regulated

if insurance companies wernt just out to screw money out of you why do we have to shop around so much rather than stick with the same company , only the other week somone posted that their policy didnt go down infact it had gone up despite no accidents or anything yet another company gave them cheaper , if they think they can get away with it they wont reward you

If you had the choice of not having insurance, but you would pay all the costs of any road accident you caused, and stand any damage,theft to your vehicle, would you?

An example of lets say a large road traffic accident, the one where the driver fell asleep and caused the train accident, the insurer for that vehicle alone (IIRC) had to pay over £20.000.000. I wonder how much his premium was for the vehicle.

I do agree with the postcode change charge thing being silly you can move to a 'better' area and be charged for the privalege, a lot of companies will also charge a 'administration fee' for this 1 min job.

And insurance companies are regulated by the FSA.

[***Mr D***]

Originally Posted by lancsdave

I got the info from this site;

http://www.ifig.org/news/

Interesting read and confirms what those of us from the Burnley area knew about a few years ago as to the main culprits.

Seems they left blackburn of that one?

But this one has a larger scale.

http://www.insurancefraudbureau.org/...se-5-12-06.pdf

[entwisi]

Chav there is more to the claim than the ferrari, what about the bus queue of young mums or the bloke who is the sole earner looking after his wife and 10 kids. Who's going to pay their living expenses when you cripple him?

My insurance is probably not the cheapest by a long chalk as I drive a reasonably powerful car and I do high mileage. I've also been on teh receiving end of a large payout when I broke my back. All I can say is that I'm glad she was insured and that I wasn't in a position of chasing her through teh courts for teh money.

IMHO you should be given an insurance 'disc' that should be displayed alongside teh tax disc with its expiry date etc on. Any cars without a valid disc should be crushed and teh owners put inside for 6 months. That would scare a few.

I've said it before on here. Its time we got tough on crime and punishment but there isn't a goverment(now or any of teh alternatives) that have the balls to do it. stop these cushy prisons, put people away if they break teh law, make them do hard labour for no wages. Its meant to be punishment, lets make it so

[WillowTheWhisp]

We should also get tough on those who submit fraudulent claims.

Not car insurance but we had interesting little experience some years ago when we had a roof blown off type flood. We contacted the insurance company, as you do, and they gave us a number to phone to get a firm out who would sort out ALL the required repairs and then bill the insurance company. Sounds good doesn't it? Far less hassle for us. We thought so too.

Then they came. We could apparently get an interim payout so we could buy immediate necessities - the repair company suggested that we add onto that some details of work that they had already done - like replastering the dining room ceiling and reflooring the bathroom. Pardon? What replastering? What flooring? They hadn't done anything! They were expecting to get paid for something that didn't even need doing!! This was the company which had the insurance approval, nay more than approval. The insurance company had sent them to us!

I phoned the insurance company and told them what had been suggested - they told us to send the repair people packing and to get in some workmen of our own and send them the bills.

[chav1]

Originally Posted by entwisi

Chav there is more to the claim than the ferrari, what about the bus queue of young mums or the bloke who is the sole earner looking after his wife and 10 kids. Who's going to pay their living expenses when you cripple him?

when an insurer takes you on it is a gamble they take in respect that you may not have an accident or you may end up costing them a lot of money , insurance companies have enough revenue coming in to cope with payouts and if they dont liek the idea that they can loose money as well as make it then they shouldnt be in buisness , they cant loose because if a big claim went in they would just spread it out over everyone elses policies who have done nothing wrong rather than loose any proffit

if any other buisness lets say a computer shop has 100 computers for sale and the owner looses 10 of the compuers in a game of cards is it right that he puts the price up on te other 90 remaining computers to cover his bad luck at gambling

lets not forget all the policy money is also gainig interes or invested in stock which i also have a sneaky suspicion that when their stock choices dont do so well tehy also pass their losses onto us

i realy do think there shoudl be a limit as to what losses they can pass on to the customer , like i said its a gamble and if they dont like the thought that they may loose money then they shouldnt gamble

i do agree that there shoudl be stickter punishment for people not having insurance and maybe if tehse companies wernt so greedy and didnt charge so much those that struggle to afford it would be able to

[entwisi]

They whole idea of insurance from both sides is a gamble. They have a right as a business to make money, like it or not. Infact if they didn't there wouldn't be any companies left for you to take insurance out with.