A warning about Adrian Flux

I decided to shop about this year for my insurance. I was with Hagerty last year but this year Adrian Flux gave a better quote which I bought. I asked for a quote for an Agreed Value policy and made it clear that I wanted an Agreed Value where I wasnt going to have to get involved with having valuations done or uploading photos etc. I was then given a price .. I was then told that you have to 'apply for the agreed value' after taking out the policy and that its £15 extra. I said this was a bit snide and got them to take the £15 off the price. I then duly paid in full for the policy. Later in the day I was sent a link to an online portal where I could manage my policy. In there I found a link to 'apply for the agreed value'. It was a bunch of forms with questions like 'how would you rate your bodywork?' and an upload area for me to submit a bunch of photos. I took one look at it and thought 'you know what - I wasn't told about this and hagerty didnt ask me all these questions and i dont have time to get the photos sorted out so ill just go with them instead'. So I renewed with Hagerty. I then contacted Adrian Flux to request cancellation of the policy under their '14 day cooling off period' .... here's the rub ... under the terms of their 14 day cooling off period you get charged a 'nominal fee' ... one by them and one by the insurance company they got you the policy with. So my money is being refunded, minus £58.

Shocking advertising for them - to think many years ago I used them.

I could be wrong, but isn't that a flagrant disregard of what the "cooling-off" period is?

Might be worth a thunderous letter to their Head Office saying that this behaviour is going to explode round the car forums and result in a drop of their business.

Terrible from Flux. Agree on the thunderous note to their leadership!

As a side note, all Club Members get 15% off Hagerty insurance

Disgusting attitude,

Essentially you were lied to, And they charge you for it?

I know its hard to ever be happy with insurers...but have to say Hagerty has been a dream compared with the old forum suggested insurers.

Awful advert for Adrian...

Glad you are back with Hagerty!

I've been with Adrian Flux for a few years. Their agreed value policy extension makes you re-submit photos on every renewal and pay the £15 fee. And they summarily reduced my agreed value after a couple of years which I thought was unreasonable. I couldn't get any explanation from them but was invited to pay for an external engineer's valuation, which I didn't want to fork out for. And I couldn't see how it works - the whole idea of an agreed valuation is that it's not a market value, but what the car is worth to replace, and they decide the premium for that level of cover. I did consider Hagerty but sadly they restrict mileage to 3000 per annum, whilst AF allow 5000.

I have now sent off a letter of complaint to Adrian Flux and left them a review on trustpilot .. ill update on what comes back. Also in case anyone is interested in the Agreed Value policy I got with Hagerty ... Its £9k agreed value, parked on my driveway and mileage limited to 3k a year (I only did 700 miles in it last year so suits me). You also get windscreen cover and RAC breakdown. The policy was £380 for me but I have speeding points (ironically not from driving the Fiat). Excess went up from £100 to £350 because I increased my agreed value from £6k to £9k .. because if my car gets written off I at least want a nice one to replace it :-)

How did that price compare with Adrian Flux?

It's hard to compare price because they depend on your age and location as well as the vehicle. My policy including agreed value of £15k cost me just over £400. I'm happy with that.

You can compare price for Williamsdad as he’s had two quotes for the same vehicle same details. I’m with Adrian Flux but I found Hagerty a lot more expensive, that was a few years ago. They may have altered their pricing since. I think they were double. If the prices are similar then I may try them again

The quote from Adrian Flux was £308 + £15 for the agreed value so £323 (But remember this isnt actually an agreed value policy its a market value policy that you may or may not be able to get an agreed value on later). The Hagerty renewal was £365 based on the agreed value of £6k and went up to £380 when I changed it to £9k (anything under £10k they don't need any information about the car)

Felt that was worth repeating.

Can't recall what my premium was with Hagerty off the top of my head - but around this figure. The renewal phone call took maybe 5 minutes. They wanted to chat more about where I was going with the car this year, then the normal dreary questions.

Sales patter? Maybe.

What I do know- is that when I ring them there is no call centre. No 45 page internet site. I'm not made to feel like its rocket science to insure a car (because it isn't really is it). They actually know what the car is. What the club is about.

And my blood pressure is never strained.

Dearer? Maybe?

Easy? Very.

The acid test will be if one of us ever has to make a claim...but lets hope we never had to.

Felt all the above was worth stating. Rock on Hagerty - one of the best things the club has done in a long time was moving to them- in my view!

Regards

MM

Been watching this correspondence with interest. I renewed few days through Adrian Flux , they are of course just a broker so don’t actually insure any cars. My premium halved from £600 ish last year , which thought high reducing to £260 this year which I’m more than happy with, changes were that my car ( 20vt ) is now garaged , mileage limit reduced from £12k to 6k which is ample for me, with an agreed value doubled to £3500 ( no charge for this ) plus I said the car alarm was disconnected which I thought would cause problems but wasn’t an issue at all. Maybe £3500 is low but I’ve seen better than mine coupes struggling to sell at not much more so was trying to be realistic.

I have a very good claims history bar driving 20 odd years into an underground car park in Bruges ( a lovely town ) forgetting about the four bikes on the car roof...........

I found dealing with AF on the phone easy , friendly and efficient .

I pay about £80 a year after cash back for fully comp 20vt with no agreed value. Love my Coupe but given how insurance companies operate would bite the bullet if the worst happened and settle for it being written off and repair at my own expense.

Update on progress - I wrote to Adrian Flux and they sent me a reply saying they have the right to charge me the fees 'as advised in your policy documents' - the ones I had not seen when I purchased the policy and thought I had 14 days to go over ... as a goodwill gesture they have refunded £15 - not sure where they got that figure from.

Also they confirmed that the £58 charge represents £30 admin fee for them and £28 for my less than 24hrs cover provided by the insurer, which on a pro rata basis would mean the policy should have cost £10,220.

Obviously everyone's experience will differ and from the comments above others have had a good experience with them and I don't want anyone to think im trying to bash Adrian Flux here - Just wanted to point out what happened in my case and make people aware of this thing with the cooling off period.

I actually looked it up - under a 14 day cooling off period, a service provider is entitled to charge an admin fee and a fee to cover a service that has been provided during the 14 days. What constitutes a fair charge - well - thats open to interpretation.

A couple of weeks ago I added a 20VT to my multi car insurance with Admiral, but I didn't proceed with the purchase so cancelled a couple of days later.

They charged an admin fee. And of course the insurance was covering me for a couple of days so I guess they have a right to charge me for that. I know insurance companies front end load their charges too, I suppose to discourage cancellations half way through.

Looks like standard practice in the industry, but doesn't excuse the attitude of Flux.... Our campervan is insured with them, but no problem so far....

Vehicle (or any insurance for that matter) is a very cut-throat and nit-picking business, and the motorist gets it in the neck from all sides. I've just renewed my multi-car policy (owner driver only) for 4 cars, reduced to 3 now, as a couple of minor "fault" scrapes in rented LWB commercial vehicles doubled the renewal quotation sent by letter to over £2000, before I'd declared the scrapes.

I’m with Adrian Flux quote this year £200, had a wee look at Hagerty they wanted near double that

Your part of the country Jim must be one of the most favourable surely...

(except when you want packages delivered )

£150 with Saga.

Hey that's good......is it agreed value?

I’ve opted for an agreed value and low mileage for the moment. I’m hardly doing any miles at all. Once a week I go shopping and that’s about twenty odd miles depending what we need. I’m happy.

I contacted a lady by the name of Emma Andrews at Adrian Flux yesterday with a few “ what if I did this questions “ and again was very pleased with the service A.F. provided.

Quotes quickly provided , nothing was too much trouble . I was a happy bunny .

Something I did learn was that insurers view the first year of an individual’s car ownership of any car as the highest risk period . And hence highest premium period I presume.

My experience is that the first year premiums are kept attractively low until renewal when they rocket skywards

Unless things have changed with FLUX I would suspect the main issue here was due to not going through renewal early enough. When I insured through them I completed all the valuation paperwork well before any policy was due to end / start. I had a clear understanding of costs and my valuation acceptance in advance of renewing any policy thus avoiding any fees if I didn't renew.

If you have, and insure, another vehicle it is usually possible to add your Coupé as a temporary additional vehicle, this gives you space and time to get an agreed value policy, and valuation sorted.

I find it odd that any insurance company is happy to accept an agreed value without seeing evidence of the existence of a vehicle. This would make it very easy for someone to insure any V5 document and then claim a total loss on the previously agreed value. The car could have been stripped / broken long before the claim with a zero chance of it, or the fraud, ever being discovered. Failure of an insurance company to be undertaking this level of personal protection against fraud would actually have some alarm bells ringing in my head - if I did ever need to claim would they actually pay out.