AXA insurance, I wonder....

[HPsauce]

Just been watching lots of ads on TV for AXA which say they include "wrong fuel cover" as standard.
Recently I accidentally put some 95RON petrol in my S8........

If I was with AXA I'd just call them up and they'd drain it out and refill with Shell V-power.

[ainarssems]

95 is not wrong, it will work just fine. I think it's just between diesel/ petrol. I wish they dropped all the extras and provided cheap no nonsense basic third party only insurance. If I am stupid or unlucky enough to crash my own car , get it stolen or it burns down I will take it on the chin, only thing I need is cover for is loss I could cause to somebody else unfortunately each year due to limited offers it is cheaper for me to take TP+F&T then third party only and sometimes even fully comp comes in cheaper.

[HPsauce]

Ainars, that won't happen. And the reason is simple.
It's the third-party risk that is expensive. Adding comprehensive cover costs them next to nothing in comparison.

I recall a conversation today about a diesel spill which resulted (due to porous road surfaces) a million-pound (or thereabouts) full dig-out and rebuilding/resurfacing of a section of motorway after a collision. That gets passed on to the insurers of the "guilty party" if they can be identified.
Your car costs sod-all in comparison to those type of risks, or the medical/support costs for someone sustaining long-term injuries in an accident.

This has changed, albeit slowly, over recent years/decades. My father worked for "The Pru" when they did car insurance (way back) and third-party was a lot cheaper because such issues didn't exist 50 or so years ago.

PS This thread started with a joke.

[ainarssems]

It's not about absolute cost, just that third party only should be the cheapest but very little companies offer it at all. If I put my details in price comparison site and cheapest TP+F&T comes back at £400, fully comp at £450 but if third party only is £1000 there is something wrong. If it was £399 I could kind of understand it.

[HPsauce]

They don't want the business, so it's not priced competitively.

[ainarssems]

The thing is most companies do not offer third party only insurance at all and the ones that offer are more expensive then cheapest TP+F&T or fully comp insurance from other companies. In my mind every insurance company should provide basic third party only cover at the cheapest cost and then charge extra on top of it if you wanted fire, theft or fully comp cover.

[Adrian E]

Their business model assumes if you're looking for the bare minimum cover there's something about your risk profile they don't understand, or that you don't care about the car and are potentially more likely to have a claim against you from a 3rd party.

I haven't bought TPF&T cover since I was about 25 - the difference was minimal at that age, and now there's just no difference at all now I'm over 40

[kele]

A way to move risk away from the insurer and onto your own shoulders is to elect for the highest possible excess. When you choose the level of excess you are indicating to the insurer something about how likely you feel you are to make a claim.

[HPsauce]

When I renewed my insurance on the "other" car last week I asked about removing the extra drivers (my adult kids, no longer at home) for a saving.

They said I was on the absolute minimum premium so it would save nothing.
They then also volunteered that my additional excesses were also pointless as taking them off would also make no difference. So they did.

Must be seen as seriously low risk for them to volunteer to remove excesses FOC without me even asking!

[jza8]

Yes you never know what makes the price up. Fully comp is usually cheapest for me and biggest excess doesn't always mean cheaper. Last time lowering my excess from £500 to £300 worked out to be cheaper.
Also the annual mileage... I would have thought less would be cheaper, but no - less than 6000 miles and premium goes up, more than 6000 miles again goes up.