LETTER: Power to the consumer

I confess with shame that when I was working, I did not switch my various insurance policies frequently enough. Stupidly, as I now have time to realise, I believed, that as a valued customer, I would be given preferential treatment. How wrong I was!
By The Newsroom
Published 1st Oct 2016, 18:00 BST
Updated 7th Jun 2018, 20:20 BST

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Since I retired, I have found the whole insurance thing very irritating.

There are the companies who put you on automatic renewal. When you ring to tell them you wish to be removed from automatic renewal, you are told the number to ring has been changed and they quickly give you the new number, so fast you have no chance of writing it down, even when they do repeat it at an equally fast pace!

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You ring the number and are told there are no operators free, but you are informed over and over again, as the minutes tick by, they will be with you shortly.

Equally irritating is the jingly background music.

Much later you do get to speak to someone, only to be told as you have a multi car policy they will have to put you through to another number.

Much better the companies who tell you from the first an operator will be with you within five minutes and hit that target

Then there is the question of how much they increase your policy from one year to the next.

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I find it amazing that when you ring up to cancel, because you think the charge is too high, the firm suddenly finds you are entitled to various discounts and offer you a much better rate.

If you hesitate and say you will see what a comparison site offers, they say - oh, do come back to us before you commit to a new company as they may be able to look at their price again.

So I say, let us demand that when insurance companies send us our renewal notices, they include last year’s charge as well as this year’s.

When we begin a new policy let us tell them we do not want to be on automatic renewal to avoid jingly music.

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Let us expect the best renewal quote first time around and if we do not like the new price, let us switch, switch, switch.

Power to the consumer and not the insurance companies.

Carole Woodland

Cooden Drive

Bexhill

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