Insurance Renewal + extra for remap

[h5djr]

I have just received my insurance renewal and I thought I share some figures with you.

For my current A3 Sportback 2.0TDI SE 170 my existing insurers want a renewal premium of £353.25. I am currently paying £349.25.

Checking online and on the phone the AA gave me a quoted of £278.15 for a similar level of cover. A saving of some £75.00.

As I'm changing my car for a new A3 Sportback 2.0TDI SE 140 in a month or so's time I thought I would check the figures for that as well.

Saga Insurance - £315.07
Norwich Union - £312.71
the AA - £266.15 - a total of £87.10 less than I'm paying at the moment.

Also out of interest I decided to ask about the premium if I decided to have the P-Torque remap done (+35bhp +50Nm)

Saga Insurance - would not quote
Norwich Union - £492.00
the AA - £475.41 - an extra premium for the remap of £209.26.

So with an extra £200+ per year for insurance and an extra £250 in excesses with the remap I will have to see if think I may benefit greatly from the remap.

These quotes are all based on age 61, married, retired, 43 years driving experience, Maximium protected NCB, no blame accidents, no current driving convictions and my wife as a named driver (aged 62 and 43 years driving experience, no accidents)

 

[NHN]

Pretty **** I'd say given your record mate

 

[hutchybee]

Pretty **** I'd say given your record mate

Definetly....

 

[dc240969]

The AA quoted you that much at your age, respect, and those years driving and the NCB. lm 39 with zero NCB and my renewal after a year with AA is £306. £550 last year.


didnt tell them about the mods.

 

[h5djr]

The AA quoted you that much at your age, respect, and those years driving and the NCB. lm 39 with zero NCB and my renewal after a year with AA is £306. £550 last year.


didnt tell them about the mods.

I don't think that after about 25 age makes a lot of difference. If I left out the Legal Cover, protected NCB and was willing to accept a higher excess I could get the premium with the AA down to around £200. I'm quite happy the with £266.15 premium for the level of cover on the none remapped car.

Personally there is no way I would not declare the remap. If I could not afford the extra insurance then I would not have the remap done. I'm not in favour of insurance fraud.

 

[Matt]

I wouldn't declare it and take the what I personally see as the very low risk of them never ever finding out as I have said in the past. In my experience with previous cars insuring modified ones is a real hassle.

Thats why I bought a standard car that I could live with staying standard.

 

[h5djr]

I wouldn't declare it and take the what I personally see as the very low risk of them never ever finding out as I have said in the past. In my experience with previous cars insuring modified ones is a real hassle.

Thats why I bought a standard car that I could live with staying standard.

Cost wise there would be very little in it between buying a 140, having it chipped, keeping it for 3 years and paying the extra on the insurance and buying a 170. On the test drives I actually preferred the 140 to the 170 and talking to the technical guys at my dealers and explaining why I preferred the 140, the reckon it's down to the 170 having a slightly larger turbo.

To compare - the difference between the 140 and the 170 is £910 + say an extra £12.00 insurance (according to my AA quotes) for 3 years = £946.

Cost of P-Torque remap is £345 + £200 additional insurance for 3 years = £945.

So there's actually nothing in it and even the basic 140, based on my own experience gives around 5mpg more than the 170 and the remap is said to give around another 5mpg.

I agree that the risk of the insurance company finding out that a car has been remapped is very low but it is still fraud. All insurance policies require you to tell your insurers of any modifications that you carry out to the standard car. I'm obviously too honest for my own good! Must be an age thing.

 

[scottie123]

christ !! were do you live? the gazaa strip!

is it anything to do with were you live perhaps?

just a thought......

 

[PaulAr]

Insurance companies dont like remaps too much.

Declaring mine cost me another £150 on my premium this year.

That said, the extra grunt is easily worth £3 per week.....

cheers
Paul

 

[hutchybee]

christ !! were do you live? the gazaa strip!

 

[h5djr]

christ !! were do you live? the gazaa strip!

is it anything to do with were you live perhaps?

just a thought......

Why do you think £266.15 is expensive!! I'm sure a lot of forum members pay a lot more than that.

Actually I live in nice quiet Cambridgeshire.

 

[h5djr]

Insurance companies dont like remaps too much.

Declaring mine cost me another £150 on my premium this year.

That said, the extra grunt is easily worth £3 per week.....

cheers
Paul

That's very true. According to the underwriter I spoke to at the AA most large companies won't touch them. He said their assumptionis that people who drive remapped cars are usually 17-20, wear their baseball caps backwards, and drive like lunatics. May well be true with some cars but not the A3 surely and the age of the driver does not seem to come into it in their minds. I don't even wear a baseball cap, let alone backwards!!

Still, as you say Paul, it may still well be worth the extra few quid a week. I could live with £475 a year with no problems if I thought it was worth it.

 

[dc240969]

Must be worth a poll. Who of us with modded motors actually tell the motor insurance company?

 

[PaulAr]

That's very true. According to the underwriter I spoke to at the AA most large companies won't touch them. He said their assumptionis that people who drive remapped cars are usually 17-20, wear their baseball caps backwards, and drive like lunatics. May well be true with some cars but not the A3 surely and the age of the driver does not seem to come into it in their minds. I don't even wear a baseball cap, let alone backwards!!

Still, as you say Paul, it may still well be worth the extra few quid a week. I could live with £475 a year with no problems if I thought it was worth it.

Its amazing how big players in the car insurance game can be so ignorant and ill informed.
And most of the `specialists` arent any better, little knowledge about the subject of remapping (or any modifications for that matter) and an absence of sympathetic premiums for tweaked cars.

Give Greenlight a try, I paid £580 for a remapped S3 (310bhp), 35yrs old, child, wife, home owner, white collar, 3 points (SP30).
Adrian Flux came in at £650, the rest of th bunch ranged from £900 to £2000

Greenlight and Adrian Flux were the only companies offerring somewehre near sensible premiums for modded cars and appeared to have a knowledge on the subject.

Good luck
Paul

 

[scottie123]

Why do you think £266.15 is expensive!! I'm sure a lot of forum members pay a lot more than that.

Actually I live in nice quiet Cambridgeshire.

i wouldnt say it was expensive, but it is not what i thought i would be for a person as yourself.

i am 31 with 5 yrs ncb with an accident 3 yrs ago , no points and my partner is 27 , been driving 3yrs and we live on a terraced road with crap parking. And the area aint what you would call 'quiet'. we pay just under £270 for a 2005 140 sportback, and when i enquired through google and checked the remap option, the premium went up around £60-£130 depending on insurer.

That is the thing with insurance though, seems abit of a lottery to me!

 

[h5djr]

i wouldnt say it was expensive, but it is not what i thought i would be for a person as yourself.

i am 31 with 5 yrs ncb with an accident 3 yrs ago , no points and my partner is 27 , been driving 3yrs and we live on a terraced road with crap parking. And the area aint what you would call 'quiet'. we pay just under £270 for a 2005 140 sportback, and when i enquired through google and checked the remap option, the premium went up around £60-£130 depending on insurer.

That is the thing with insurance though, seems abit of a lottery to me!

Remember that we are talking about a brand new £24k car. The cars value can make quite a difference to the insurance premium especially as it covers replacing the car with a new one for the first 12 months. The only quotes I have so far are both through the AA. I am going to try and find one or two others. I have just completed, at Paul's suggestion, a quote form for Greenlight to see how they compare.

 

[scottie123]

Remember that we are talking about a brand new £24k car. The cars value can make quite a difference to the insurance premium especially as it covers replacing the car with a new one for the first 12 months. The only quotes I have so far are both through the AA. I am going to try and find one or two others. I have just completed, at Paul's suggestion, a quote form for Greenlight to see how they compare.

didnt think of that

 

[h5djr]

Well I've just received a quote by email from GreenLight for my new A3 Sportback 2.0TDI-140 S-tronic if I decide to have it remapped. They are quoting £472.70 with a £250 excess which is basically the same as the AA were quoting through Norwich Union. So it seems that that is probably the going rate. Still somewhat more than the quote from the AA of £266.15 for the same car without the remap.

 

[frenchy2475]

I had to go deliver some parts today and I had a service loan car which was a Sportback 170tdi cr. It felt very rough compaired to my remapped 140. The power delivery was very on off. It didnt pull that well from low revs and power tended to tail off as you reached near 5k. Also noticed the engine was quite noisy compaired to 140 . Just didn't feel as nice to drive as the 140.

I can see why you opted to go for the 140 Dave