Car insurance

Can someone help,please?

In recent years I have visited Spain frequently and have rented cars. I am tax resident in the UK and drive the hire cars on my UK car insurance.

Sometime early next year I will more permanently to Spain and become tax resident in Spain.

At that point I will buy a car in Spain.

What should I do about insurance? Should I find a Spanish car insurance company or would my UK company be likely to continue to insure me? Would my maximum No Claims Discount be recognised in Spain?

Would a Spanish insurance policy allow me to drive cars on my return to the UK.

I'm sure I'm not alone in having this problem. Any views?

All answers gratefully received.

What problem? You buy a car in Spain, use a Spanish insurance company. You have loads to choose from and most include breakdown cover. A UK company normally (but there are exceptions) will only cover you for 3 months and reduce the cover to 3rd party unless you pay extra to keep fully comp.

If you copy a Spanish company  your current policy they will give you a quote based on your driving experience but the NCD doesn't quite work like it does in UK. 

Spanish companies will allow you to drive in any EU country (including UK) for a certain period without reducing the cover.

Can't see any reason for keeping a UK insurance company when you are moving over to Spain.

Hello Neil and welcome to EOS

It would be interesting to know how you drive Spanish hire cars on your own UK insurance.

Probably the hire car excess insurance you can take out. About £40 a year to cover any charges from the hire company.

We used it for UK and had to claim after hitting the pothole from Hell. New tyre and 1 new alloy wheel and the insurance company paid up straight away.

So you think Neil wants to buy a Spanish car and drive it in Spain on a UK excess only policy.

Amazing how you can read things into a post that aren't there. You asked how he drove hire cars on UK insurance and now change it to driving a car he buys on that same insurance.

Bit silly, really.

You can legally drive a Spanish hire car on your UK insurance, regardless of whether you have the 'excess insurance' or not. That is what I have been doing as a tourist.

What I'm planning ahead for is for when - next year - I move to Spain full time and buy a car in Spain. It would be easier if any UK insurance companies had their own operations in Spain - but maybe not. I wonder if Mr Kavanagh has misunderstood my request?

It looks like I'll have to take the bull by the horns and, when I buy a Spanish car, take out a Spanish insurance policy. As we are - for now - in the EU a Spanish policy would, I understand, cover me to drive a third party's car on my trips back to the UK.

Thanks for all views offered.

Hello Neil

You are making too many general assumptions. Car insurance policies vary greatly in the UK and Spain. We have already got Marie muddling things with driving Spanish cars on a £40 UK policy and your OP as if you do not need or use Spanish car hire insurance.

''Would a Spanish insurance policy allow me to drive cars on my return to the UK.'' You would need to read the policy terms & condtions or contact the underwritters, and that applies to all your questions, UK or Spanish policy.

There is an icon at the top left of this page where EOS and there recommended partners explain and give advice about car insurance.

Just keep it simple.

"It would be easier if any UK insurance companies had their own operations in Spain"

Easier? Why? It would be easier, if you are serious about moving to and living full time in Spain, to change your mindset. Spain is not a province of the UK. You need to start thinking about what it really means to live in a different country. For example, at some point you will probably change your UK licence for a Spanish one.

Luckily, you will find plenty of Spanish insurance companies that speak English and offer policy documents in English - plenty, even, that cater specifically to expats. Try Google. Perhaps you could start with Linea Directa. Although they started their Spanish operations as an offshoot of Direct Line, they are actually no longer connected. Don't let that put you off though.

In answer to a couple of your questions: yes, your NCD from the UK (EU) may be recognised by a Spanish insurer, but you may have to shop around to find one that does (IBEX, for example, does); Spanish car insurance covers the car, not the driver - so no, it wouldn't cover a hire car in the UK - but surely when you hire a car in the UK (or anywhere for that matter) you get insurance from the hire company??

There's good advice here from MarieDav and Roberto.  It should be very straight forward. 

I used car hire companies for many years, but bought a car here 5/6 years ago and produced a copy NCB to Linea Directa and that was it, sorted.

The premium is a lot less for me than in UK for a very comparable motor too.

This may, or may not help you Neilg, and no doubt it will be contested, I am in the car world, not car insurance one bit, if you do buy a car in Spain get Spanish insurance for the car, that much you know.

Over the past 6 weeks I have met 3 people in the UK who have had car accidents, one a 23 year old who had his car smashed up the rear and written of by a drunk driver, his insurance paid out, yet when he came to insure the next car his insurance went up nearly double due to a 'No fault claim' .....Never heard of this before but apparently been around for a couple of years.

Another chap who I have just bought his Volvo from was told if he claimed for the damage done by a driver who drove away he would lose a good portion of his no claims, and his new insurance would rise considerably due to a 'No fault claim'

Yet again another person came in who had the same thing a couple of weeks ago, not his fault, his next insurance premiums rose due to yet again  'No fault claim'

Something perhaps to dwell on if you were to even consider getting any car insurance for your Spanish car in the UK, imagine if this happened, you in Spain...Insurance in the UK = Hassle.

I have never heard of this before, it seems slightly illegal, but as we are all aware of if any insurance company can get away with something such as this..... They will do it.

I’ve 2 none faults against me in the uk and they have charged me extra because of them on a number of policies.

Baz1946, I had a rear end shunt in Spain which actually wrote-off the car.   I phoned my insurer and struggled to persuade them that I wasn't making a claim on the policy, but claiming against the Third Party.

Subsequently I had a call from one of their top claims guys who insisted that I would not lose out by their handing the claim.  Exactly that happened.  They even arranged for a car for me and I had a very reasonable settlement for the written off vehicle which no doubt they recovered from the Third Party insurers.

A year or two ago a vehicle drove into my wife's vehicle.  She apologised to me wife and gave her details and that of her insurer which all proved false.  But I visited the address she had given which was a rented flat so it was not difficult to track her down.  So I made contact with her and she kept on telling me porkies so I involved the Police.  They were pathetic.  I received a letter after 6 months saying they were no pursuing the matter as t was beyond their 6 month time limit.  I was incensed, but it seemed they called round to interview her and she was out!

So I successfully had all the repair costs paid by the Motor Insurers Bureau (MIB).  The MIB is funded by UK insurers to pay for both injury and damage claims incurred by uninsured motorists.

Four things to emphasise from my experience

~ You have to be a little bit in control - a "no claims" bonus is exactly what it says.  So don't expect any different.

~ If you chat to the insurer, they may provide an excellent service, beyond what you might expect.

~ The Police are a waste of space in such situations - I was told "we don't have the manpower".

~ The MIB exists to provide protection against claims that would otherwise have been paid, if the guilty driver was insured or unknown.  It is standard EU law so will apply exactly the same in Spain.  All due to the generosity of these nice insurance companies (and the legislation). 

I cannot think of many other business sectors provide a similar safety net.  So please let's not knock the insurers unfairly.

Thankfully I havent had the experience of dealing with insurance people over accident claims, yet, what I posted was from 3 other people, I never followed up on what happened, if anything at all, as it wasnt me.

I do however know about the unisured drivers, my son had his Mustang written of in the same way, did very well out of it after about 3 months, enought to buy a newer bigger Mustang.

I was giving my experience to balance the picture.  Your post ended with:

...as we are all aware of if any insurance company can get away with something such as this..... They will do it.

Well, not my experience.  Life would be a lot easier if we had their professional standards in other sectors.

You mention you are in the "car world"...if I recall, there's been a few serious cheats revealed recently - VW, Mitsubishi, Fiat, Chrysler, Citoen, Daimler, Peugrot etc vis a vis emissions...mmm...there's an expression re glass houses...!

I was told if you have 1 non fault claim? Statistically you will have another!!! And I did as it happens!!!

i also stopped protecting my no claims years ago, as I was told after I made a claim for theft, that I had to stick with the original insurer the next year which was so much more expensive than everyone else? I’m going back 20 years, but that had stopped me protecting.

I have been with LV for my UK car for many years. Had a no-fault claim several years ago - they were very helpful and it didnt alter my premium.

However, every renewal, the price seems to go up. I always go onto one of the comparison sites and get a new quote where there is invariably a LV quote which is less. 

I ring up and say ' got my renewal notice here, but I see otn Moneysupermarket you are quoting 10% less?

OK says he, lets hsve a look - oh yes, I'll match that'

Job done, every time!

BTW, my car here in Spain I use Ibex at Quesada for insurance. Great service and very helpful staff.

Steve

You mention you are in the "car world"...if I recall, there's been a few serious cheats revealed recently - VW, Mitsubishi, Fiat, Chrysler, Citoen, Daimler, Peugrot etc vis a vis emissions...mmm...there's an expression re glass houses...!

Not to sure what you mean by your above statement acer,  yes I am in the car world, Garage, MOT Station, Car Sales, I know about the car problems mentioned, presuming the re-calls.

Am I to understand from your post that because I am in this field these car problems have somehow got something to do with me, hence I shouldn't be knocking or making false claims about insurance companies. Re glass houses , etc.

A couple of answers to my post mentioned they had no problems, thats very good news for them and you, I mentioned that the people I spoke with were all from the UK with UK cars and UK car insurance, not Spain cars or Spain car insurance, perhaps this is the clue,  Spain is so much better at this then what the UK is.

On a side issue and nothing to do with this post,  emissions seeing as you mentioned this, is the least of anyones problems, Vauxhall catching on fire, BMW diesel fuel filter heater = Fire, plus ongoing faults Honda and most other Jap cars, think that one was in the region of 500,000 plus world wide, serious Airbag fault that smashed your face in if they went of, Ford auto gearboxes, plus many other re-calls that slip by the media, BMC had re-calls on the very first Mini brake fluid system soon after they came out all those years ago.

No! Baz1946, not so.

I was making the point that no business sector is perfect in response to your unfriendly comment towards motor insurer, where, incidentally, I have no connection.

I wasn't meant at all personally - just pointing out that my experience, and it seems others, have a very positive experience with motor insurers.

Yet once again, perhaps not from you, but replied with something which has not answered any point I made, and it's only 2 people who have posted positive outcomes on here so far, you being one of them. I don't take anything personally either.

The only 'Unfriendly' comment I made was to say that if any insurance company can get away with something then they will, like the poster who mentioned that when he came to renew, it had gone up, queried it and it came down, I do this every time and it works...Some of the time...Hence why I said if they can get away with it, they will, how many people never checked or phoned around and just paid the increase, insurance companies rack up the premium because they know full well many just pay the increase.

I had a robbery in one of my cars, stole every item in it, garage equipment, I had a massive top of the range full goods in transit policy, when It came to claim they wriggled and told me because I wasn't in the car at the time I wasn't covered, made no difference when I said that ' If I was in the car they wouldn't have stolen the goods' I took it all the way to Threadneedle Street where they were based, I won the payout, they didn't pay out because they were in the right, they tried it on and lost.