London insurance advice

[ewenandkerri]

After a series of very frustrating calls, my partner and I have managed to obtain reasonably priced insurance for our Bongo, a 321-away Montague conversion we are purchasing from the first UK owners. Hopefully other Londoners will find our experience useful.

Many of the places that came recommended from Bongo Fury, such 2Gether and Camping and Caravaning Club, would not give us a quote, because the Bongo is our only vehicle (we live in London and cycle everywhere) and the policy holder (my partner) does not have a No Claims Benefit (even though she's been a named driver on her parents' policy for more 8 years). It didn't help that we are young (early 30s) and we will store the car on-street in Islington. Other insurers, whose names I can't remember, came back with ridiculous-seeming quotes, in the £1200-£1500 range.

Adrian Flux and Crosby/Eclipse (one is the broker, the other the actual insurer) offered reasonable quotes around £530. We bought the Crosby/Eclipse policy because they offered a lower £100 deductible.

Camping and Caravaning Club told us they require a 1-year NCB, so we may go back to them in a year to see what they can offer.

Hope this someday helps other frustrated Londoners out there.

[umbongocat]

Hi,

We live in North London and used to park our bongo on the road. Our bongo came from 321 Away too and was fully converted. The first year we took out insurance was quite expensive. I think we paid about £450.00 after that we insured with camping and caravan and still do.

No longer have our Bongo but a motorhome now but I have to say that we've been very pleased with Camping and Caravan for our insurance. We also took out european cover for £60 it is. Did a big trip round Europe several years ago and ended up breaking down on the last leg of the trip. They paid for hotels, flights back for myself and my 2 daughters and hire car and repatriated the vehicle to 321 where it was fixed.

I would find someone who is reasonable this year and then change to Camping and Caravan as soon as you can if you're members.

Good luck, I remember the nightmare we had when phoning around.

[AllyPallyBongo]

This sounds exactly the same problem we had when we first bought ours: zero no claims/Bongo our only vehicle/parking on street. We even live in North London too. The only difference being ours is unconverted (and I suspect the market value is a lot less).

After receiving similar silly quotes from the handful of insurers who would agree cover - one of them quoted over £4k! We found the best price through Admiral. The first year was a bit steep at around £700 but they do an accelerated no claims bonus scheme and our renewal this year came in just over £300.

After a bit of a run in with a grass verge in South Wales this summer I was expecting the quote to shoot up again due to the accident and loss of no claims but the renewal price has only gone up by another £100 so all I can assume is that Admiral's prices have dropped on the whole.

Oh - and re: the claim. I couldn't say that Admiral were the best company I've ever dealt with (had to chase them up regularly) but they were by no means the worst either

Hope this helps

[Johnbailey84]

Interesting to hear your experiences.

I haven't managed to get anything better than £1100 for the year with Elephant Insurance.

I tried 2gether and Lifesure both wouldn't even provide a quote. Adrian Flux said they were unable to match the quote from Elephant.

Similarly to you guys, we are young-ish (29 & 31), live in London and do not have any NCB as we have both been named drivers on our parents cars rather than having our own insurance policies. Again, we both cycle to work and we'll pretty much just use the Bongo for holidays so it'll hardly be used too frequently!

If anyone can get me anything near to £700-£800 I'd bite their hand off!!

[scanner]

Similarly to you guys, we are young-ish (29 & 31), live in London and do not have any NCB as we have both been named drivers on our parents cars rather than having our own insurance policies. Again, we both cycle to work and we'll pretty much just use the Bongo for holidays so it'll hardly be used too frequently!

My daughter is much the same age BUT she has had insurance in her own name since she was 17.

An example of the difference this makes. She had at 18 a Citroen AX GT at 19 a Renault 5 GT Turbo and at 23 she had an Escort RS Cosworth - she has never paid more than £800 for fully comp insurance - ever.

Admittedly she doesn't live in London either - BUT - it just goes to show that suddenly (without any personal insurance history) trying to get insurance in London is not a good place to start. Your proposal must cause most insurers to have palpitations.