Can anyone help me to understand car insurance?

[twobears]

I am getting in a right muddle with car insurance at the moment because I have a Fiat as my main car but which my daughter sometimes drives. I am insured as the main driver and my daughter is a named driver. My husband has a company car so we thought it would be best if he insured the Zed with me as a named driver so that the insurance company don't think I am trying to pull a fast one and that my daughter is really the main driver of the Fiat because she isn't as I use it every weekday and she only uses it at weekends.

 

We thought everything had gone through smoothly but my husband has just been told that he hasn't got any no claims bonus when it comes to insuring the Zed because you can't build up NCB on two cars. I've never heard of this rule but, assuming it's correct, I don't know what to do for the best. Insurance seems a bit of a minefield at the best of times so if anyone here works in insurance, please can you give me some advice? I'd be very grateful. The insurance company won't speak to me about husband's insurance policy without him authorising them to do so but I can't get hold of him as he's working away. Thanks

[Sarnie]

It's true that you can't accumulate NCD on two cars, unless the insurance company will mirrow the NCD he has, which not all do.

 

Have you tried to a multicar policy with Admiral?

Who is the legal owner of the zed, you or your husband?

[rabbitstew]

Not sure I understand this right.

 

You have a FIAT - your the main driver and the insurance is in your name.

He has the zed - he`s down as the main driver and the insurance in his name.

 

So where is the insurance company saying he cant have ncb on 2 cars? He`s only getting NCB on the zed and your getting NCB on the FIAT.

 

Unless there is something weird going on with the company car.. in my experience of company cars is that the company pays the insurance and thats it. I dont know if they get any kind of NCB on it, but its nothing to do with your husband`s insurance. Unless for some reason he is insuring the company car in his own name, thus getting NCB on it?!

[twobears]

Thanks Sarnie. The Zed is my toy and my name is on the V5. He was (or thought he was) insured with Direct Line so obviously they won't mirror his NCB then? I've never heard of a multi car policy but I will give Admiral a call after I've eaten my lunch. Thanks I am just anxious not to make the insurer suspicious that I am not the main driver of my Fiat because I truly am and I don't want to have to pay an exorbitant sum to insure a teenager as the main driver

 

Sorry rabbitstew for the confusion. Both the Fiat and the Zed are mine. I drive the Fiat in the week and the Zed at weekends. Husband has a company BMW and I assumed that his NCB was either still accumulating or at least not decreasing whilst he was insured by the company to drive it? I really hate trying to navigate my way through this, especially as I can't actually speak to either my husband or his firm at present to find out the material facts

[Stew]

Moved the topic.

 

 

 

Insurance is a minefield....

 

Best to be honest. You could check with one of our approved insurers on the forum. You can also compare the meerkat until your heart is content. Just remember to keep the main and named drivers honest and true.

 

You might be able to find someone to mirror your no claims. Otherwise depending on your daughters age / driving experience it might be better to move the NCB to the Zed.

[rabbitstew]

Thanks Sarnie. The Zed is my toy and my name is on the V5. He was (or thought he was) insured with Direct Line so obviously they won't mirror his NCB then? I've never heard of a multi car policy but I will give Admiral a call after I've eaten my lunch. Thanks I am just anxious not to make the insurer suspicious that I am not the main driver of my Fiat because I truly am and I don't want to have to pay an exorbitant sum to insure a teenager as the main driver

 

Sorry rabbitstew for the confusion. Both the Fiat and the Zed are mine. I drive the Fiat in the week and the Zed at weekends. Husband has a company BMW and I assumed that his NCB was either still accumulating or at least not decreasing whilst he was insured by the company to drive it? I really hate trying to navigate my way through this, especially as I can't actually speak to either my husband or his firm at present to find out the material facts

 

Hmmm... I think the first point of call will be to check with your husbands company with regards to ncb, as i thought ncb only goes on your own insurance policy and presumably the bmw would be under his companys policy and not his.

 

The main problem you have here though is that both the fiat and zed are in your names, and some insurance companies do not like people insuring cars which are not in their name. So, if your husband went to insure the zed, this could present a problem as the zed is in your name.

 

In addition, if you tried to insure both in your name, that too would cause problems as you can only use ncb against one car, and so effectively you`d have your fiat with ncb on it, and then no ncb on the zed which would give a very high premium.

 

I am in a similar boat. How it works for me is... My missus has a company car - her company pays insurance. My missus`s is the named owner of our family "shed", and as such she insures that with her ncb and im down as a named driver. Im the owner of the zed and i insure that with my ncb.

[twobears]

Thanks for moving my post. Rookie mistake on my part

 

I am being totally honest about the fact that I am the main driver of the Fiat as I wouldn't do anything to invalidate my insurance. My daughter is at college all week and the car sits here on the drive for me to use. She uses it at weekends only, so two days compared to my five days.

 

I think I just need to grit my teeth and plough on with comparing insurance quotes don't I? hoped that approaching them with a bit of prior knowledge about the subject might be best as I am always wary of getting ripped off by big companies.

 

rabbitstew, I need to find out more about my husband's company insurance then. Trouble is he is currently in a plane somewhere and even when he lands he'll be straight into another meeting miles away so goodness knows when I can speak to him and, even then he will have to speak to whoever deals with car insurance at his firm. This is such a pain. I hate trying to make decisions without having the full facts at my disposal but I am worrying that the Zed isn't insured now as I don't know how my husband has left things with Direct Line

[Sarnie]

My initial concern is that you have insured your husband as the main driver of the zed, when he is not the legal owner of the car. Most insurers require the main driver to be the owner.

 

If your husband is on his companies insurance, he cannot be accumulating personal NCD. If you think about it, NCD is granted for each year that you have a policy without claiming, but your husband doesn't have a policy as he is (assumedly) on his companies insurance. How many years has he been insured via the company? Or, how long ago is it since he had his own personal policy? You need to be wary if it's been a few years, as you can't rack up say 10 years of NCD, have a few years off whilst you drive a company car, and then suddenly start up a policy claiming the 10 years NCD that you accumulated previously.......

[twobears]

My initial concern is that you have insured your husband as the main driver of the zed, when he is not the legal owner of the car. Most insurers require the main driver to be the owner.

 

I hadn't actually thought about that I was just so worried that the insurers would think that I was lying about my Fiat and me being the main driver that I never considered the ownership of the Zed at all.

 

Regarding the length of my husband's insurance via his company, er, I've no idea. Must be over fifteen years at least. He had a CBR that he sold a few years ago so would that have counted towards his NCB or does it only work if you build up NCB on a similar vehicle?

 

Sorry for all these questions but the more information I can get before starting to ring around the better as I am sure that I will be asked all the questions that you helpful people are asking me anyway

[rabbitstew]

My initial concern is that you have insured your husband as the main driver of the zed, when he is not the legal owner of the car. Most insurers require the main driver to be the owner.

 

I hadn't actually thought about that I was just so worried that the insurers would think that I was lying about my Fiat and me being the main driver that I never considered the ownership of the Zed at all.

 

Regarding the length of my husband's insurance via his company, er, I've no idea. Must be over fifteen years at least. He had a CBR that he sold a few years ago so would that have counted towards his NCB or does it only work if you build up NCB on a similar vehicle?

 

Sorry for all these questions but the more information I can get before starting to ring around the better as I am sure that I will be asked all the questions that you helpful people are asking me anyway

 

So what we are saying here, is that your husband has had company cars insured through companies for the last 15 years and not insured any cars of his own in that time? In which case, what NCB is he putting down and proving for insuring the zed atm? It might be that he is using the NCB built up on the motorbike down to the zed as its very doubtful any NCB he had prior to company cars would count. Some insurance companies will let you use years of company car experience count towards some NCB if you are moving from company cars to your own private car, but not if you have both.

 

I think you need to discuss it all with your husband and clarify exactly what the situation is, then you can workout the way forward as theres so many options depending up on the exact circumstances.

 

Id be interested to hear the answer though and hear how you previously had it all insured.

[Sarnie]

My initial concern is that you have insured your husband as the main driver of the zed, when he is not the legal owner of the car. Most insurers require the main driver to be the owner.

 

I hadn't actually thought about that I was just so worried that the insurers would think that I was lying about my Fiat and me being the main driver that I never considered the ownership of the Zed at all.

 

Regarding the length of my husband's insurance via his company, er, I've no idea. Must be over fifteen years at least. He had a CBR that he sold a few years ago so would that have counted towards his NCB or does it only work if you build up NCB on a similar vehicle?

 

Sorry for all these questions but the more information I can get before starting to ring around the better as I am sure that I will be asked all the questions that you helpful people are asking me anyway

 

 

I think you need to discuss it all with your husband and clarify exactly what the situation is, then you can workout the way forward as theres so many options depending up on the exact circumstances.

 

 

+1

 

You need to clarify with your husband, where he gained the NCD that he is using on the zed? If it's fifteen years of not claiming on the company cars insurance, then he needs to clarify with the insurer of the zed that this is acceptable, as as far as I'm aware, it's not.

 

If he is using NCD that he had from his CBR, he also needs to clarify that this is acceptable as a) it's a motorbike and if this was a few years ago, how big a gap will the insurer allow in insurance policies to allow you to carry on the NCD. As I said previously, you can't build up a load of NCD and then not have a policy for a few years and then just start up a policy using the previous NCD. NCD is given for CONSECUTIVE years of not claiming, any break in insurance, renders the previous NCD invalid usually.

[twobears]

rabbitstew, you are absolutely right and I've decided that I don't actually have anywhere near enough information to deal with the insurers at this point. I don't even know if my husband has insured any cars privately in recent years We have had some commercial vehicles for the business as well as several cars in the last few years but we both drove them all so no idea who was named as the main driver. I must sound really dumb but I hate doing this sort of paperwork and have always left it to him. Odd really as i do everything else like this but I have a bit of blind spot when it comes to insurance for some reason. I wish he wasn't so bloomin' busy at the moment and could sort it out himself but he's working silly hours and it's not fair of me to expect him to take on any more jobs

 

Thanks Sarnie. You're right too! I am glad that I asked on here rather than making a fool of myself on the phone with the insurers and getting myself tied in knots trying to understand what they were saying to me I am now wondering if husband has any NCD at all????

[Ekona]

If it's only from a company car, then it's incredibly unlikely he has any NCB. You may be able to get a letter from his company insurers stating he's never had a claim over X years, but whether the individual insurer will accept that is totally up to them.

 

The gap allowed before NCB disappears is 2 years.

[twobears]

Thanks to everyone who has helped me so understand how car insurance works. Just spoken to my husband and he is going to ring insurers to sort things out tonight. Apparently, he has got some current NCD from the other cars we've owned so, hopefully, everything will work out ok. I don't normally get my knickers in a twist over things like this but I was panicking that Zedbelly was sitting on the drive uninsured I haven't driven him for ages due to the horrible weather but I would hate anything to happen to him.

[spursmaddave]

Dont want to muddy the waters but when we are talking about the 'legal owner' do you mean the registered keeper on the log book? Totally different thing, legally being the registered keeper does not make you the owner of the car

[twobears]

SMD, that's confused me even more What determines legal ownership then?

[spursmaddave]

I am certainly no expert and things might have changed but when i split up with an ex in 2007 'my' car bought and paid for by me was registered in her name, legally she had no rights to the car, i had proof of payment and she couldn't prove that it was given as a gift so it was mine :woohoo:

[twobears]

Dave (and anyone else who's interested), insurance now sorted. Both my Fiat and my Zed are insured with me as the main driver and my husband as a named driver. Daughter is named driver on the Fiat too. It got even more bizarre and complex in the end as my husband said that the insurers told him it was a good job he wasn't the main driver of the Zed as they wouldn't have insured him. Er, doesn't make sense since they have insured him as the named driver and told him that, if he were not the a named driver, my insurance would have cost more Absolutely none of this makes any sense so I don't know why I even tried to apply logic to it in the first place.

[Sarnie]

For insurance purposes the legal owner is the same as the Keeper of the vehicle eg the name on the V5, that will show up on the ANPR searches etc.

 

When you take out insurance they will ask if you are the legal owner and or keeper of the vehicle. My concern is that if twobears is down as the owner/keeper of the zed of the V5 then Mr twobears cannot insure it as the owner/keeper and then put twobears down as a named driver.

 

Similarly, twobears daughter could not insure the FIAT in her name as the main driver without changing the V5 over to reflect her new status as the owner/keeper of the vehicle.

 

My M3 was bought and paid for by me, so the V5 and subsequent insurance was in my name and Mrs Sarnie as named driver.

 

When we got the Alfa, it was cheaper to insure it with her as the main driver and me as the named driver, which mean't the car was registered in her name and the V5 reflects this.

[Sarnie]

Dave (and anyone else who's interested), insurance now sorted. Both my Fiat and my Zed are insured with me as the main driver and my husband as a named driver. Daughter is named driver on the Fiat too. It got even more bizarre and complex in the end as my husband said that the insurers told him it was a good job he wasn't the main driver of the Zed as they wouldn't have insured him. Er, doesn't make sense since they have insured him as the named driver and told him that, if he were not the a named driver, my insurance would have cost more Absolutely none of this makes any sense so I don't know why I even tried to apply logic to it in the first place.

 

Glad you got it sorted in the end.

 

I'm pretty sure that they have said that they would wouldn't have insured him on the zed as the main driver due to the fact that he would have zero NCD.

 

You have to think about it from a risk point of view. Lets say a main driver drives the car 90% of the time and the named driver 10%. From an insurers point of view, you want the person who is the main driver and exposing them to risk 90% of the time, to be the lowest risk e.g high NCD and probably female etc.

 

Conversely it also makes sense for an insurer to spread the risk, hence why it is usually cheaper to add someone else to a policy.

 

Granted it doesn't make a lot of sense to most people but the logic is sound and I've not heard of many insurance companies going bust so they obviously know what they are doing.......

[spursmaddave]

Dave (and anyone else who's interested), insurance now sorted. Both my Fiat and my Zed are insured with me as the main driver and my husband as a named driver. Daughter is named driver on the Fiat too. It got even more bizarre and complex in the end as my husband said that the insurers told him it was a good job he wasn't the main driver of the Zed as they wouldn't have insured him. Er, doesn't make sense since they have insured him as the named driver and told him that, if he were not the a named driver, my insurance would have cost more Absolutely none of this makes any sense so I don't know why I even tried to apply logic to it in the first place.

 

Car Insurance is like having a poo, you know you have to do it and you know it will be messy but if you put it off........

 

Glad your all sorted

[twobears]

Sarnie, I think I understand that but it does make my brain hurt a bit

 

Anyone else think SMD has a certain way with words?

[KyleR]

I would've thought the best thing for you to do would be to set up a multi car policy with Admiral with your NCB on the ZED, hubby as named driver and then insure the Fiat with no NCB and daughter as named. Don't worry about the insurance company thinking you might be trying to pull wool over their eyes. That's not their problem unless there is a claim, then they will investigate and see you're not

[rabbitstew]

When we got the Alfa, it was cheaper to insure it with her as the main driver and me as the named driver, which mean't the car was registered in her name and the V5 reflects this.

 

Thats pretty normal. The other year I got 2 insurance quotes for exactly the same car. One in my missus`s name with me as named driver and one in my name with her as a named driver.

 

She only had 5 years ncb and had made a claim. I had 20 years ncb and no claims. The quote in her name came back a lot cheaper than the one in my name.

[bigmike20vt]

Personally I think i understand car insurance and the quotes perfectly.

 

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/eduwonke ... w_col4.JPG

 

with admiral multicar it looks like my Zed is going to work out CHEAPER than my wifes 1.2l punto worth around £1.5k, with us both as named drivers on each others policy.

 

Am not complaining, (not crossed the i's and dotted the t's until tomorrow so I guess it could go wrong) but the quote for the zed is crazy cheap. I just dont see how it is sustainable as a business model and its not often i say that about insurance.