Do you check your insurances regularly?

The first thing people think off (generally speaking) is, “yep I got the cheapest deal I could find”.
This is wrong. That should be the last question you ask as it is important, but probably not the be all and end all….

When did you last check all your insurances? Home insurance? Car insurance? Life insurance? Mobile phone insurance? Van insurance? Public liability insurance? Travel insurance? … So on and so on….There are so many!

But when did you last CHECK them?

The purpose of insurance is to put you back into the same situation that you were in prior to the event happening. It’s about getting what you want from a policy, when you need it.

First Question: Do you need it!? Stupid question, but a goodin’ – DO YOU EVEN NEED IT!? Generally, home insurance will cover your mobile phone under “personal possessions” part of your policy. Then a lot of people will pay, sometimes even more per month for the mobile phone insurance than what it is to insure their whole house, on top. Why? It’s already insured. Save yourself £15/£20/£25 p/m by getting rid of it. (if you’re not sure if your home insurance policy covers it, send me a pic of your schedule and I’ll let you know). Some people pay for breakdown cover for their car, when they are already fully covered on their car insurance policy or from their bank account – Why!?

Second question: always ask yourself, does this insurance policy cover me for what I need? If the answer to that is no, then why on earth are you paying for it? Now, this could be price driven, particularly when referencing life insurance, but it’s good to ask why?
If the answer is yes, then we progress the questioning!

Third question: is the customer service good? I’ll position this question another way though…the way and methods that they have in place to service your requests and needs, are they suitable for you? There are loads of methods of customer service. Phone calls are not the only way you can do business. Is the online service, seamless and easy? Can you just walk into the shop and talk to a real life actual person? Are you happy with the phone service..? If the answer to that is yes, we progress it further.

Question four: Does it have any additional stuff that’s actually quite useful to ME (you!)? It’s great having loads of additional items, but is there a need, want or benefit? Could you see yourself using them? If yes, then read on to progrees!

So the covers good, it’s got loads of add-ons which are mostly relevant to me (you) and I love how they do business. Now’s the time to start asking the in depth questions, particularly surrounding price.

Question five: are there excesses to pay? There are two types of excesses, one you will definitely have to pay, if stipulated and one which you don’t have to pay. Compulsory excess is the one that you HAVE to pay in the event of claiming. In English, you need to claim for something, you will have to pay the insurance company £100 (if that’s what was set) before the insurance company pay anything out to you. There’s also voluntary excess. This is where it gets a bit tricky. A voluntary excess is the amount you pay ON TOP OFF the compulsory excess. So If you put a voluntary excess of £100 AND you needed to claim. You’d have to pay £200 (£100 compulsory and £100 voluntary) before the insurance company pay anything out/fix/ replace whatever it is you’re trying to claim for. Sometimes insurance companies ASSUME you want to put a voluntary excess on your policy, so read the policy carefully before purchasing! Also you can have different excesses on one policy, depending on what you are claiming for. For example claiming for damage to your vehicle might have a compulsory excess of £100, fire and theft could be £150 and claiming for windscreen could be £50. Some insurance companies will tell you that by adding a voluntary excess to your policy will actually REDUCE your premium… Which…technically…is true. It might. But are you prepared to pay £100 extra in the event of a claim, if it brings your annual premium down by only a few quid?? Maybe.. I’ll leave that for you to decide. Happy with the excesses? Cool, moving onto the final question!

Question 6: how much is all this going to cost?
The question everyone is concerned about. If It’s still shouldn;t be the decision maker though. If all of the above is perfect but costs £1,000,000,000 then….well, for the majority, you probably won’t be buying the policy.

If the price is fair and you are happy with the above 5 other questions, then buy the policy.

Remember to get quotes directly from insurance companies and brokers, sometimes its actually cheaper to go through a broker than direct!

Also – head to your local insurance broker, some of the smaller firms can actually compete and go toe to toe with the big boys.