Pay as you go car insurance

My car insurance is due for renewal next week and my renewal quote from my current insurer, Norwich Union, is over £500 for this year, up £140 from last year. I have heard of pay as you go insurance but don't know much about it. Has any one used it? I assume it's aimed mainly at new/young drivers.

I don't use my car much. Only use it locally for going to the gym 3-4 times a week and to visit the shops maybe 2-3 times a week. I have almost 5 years' no claims discount and have never had an accident. Any advice would be appreciated.

My father uses Norwich Union Direct PAYG insurance. It works for him, but he only does about 2-3k miles a year. It is aimed at low milage drivers and very definitely not at the young (I think NU has a lower age limit) but more at older drivers who are retired and don't do the miles to the factory each day.

[mitchja]

I dont know anything about pay as you go car insurance but I never accept my re-newal quote. Go to confused.com and you enter your details once and the web site does all the work for you checking something like 25 insurance quotes for you (including Norwich Union).

I've always found that car insurance companies always give new customers better deals. I've never had the same company insure my car for longer than 12 months.

Regards

[Decker]

With 5 years NCD ESure should be a good bet if you can overcome the revulsion of ordering a product advertised by Michael Winner.

Originally posted by mitchja

I've never had the same company insure my car for longer than 12 months.

Nor have I.

Tried confused.com a few weeks ago and I did find several quotes cheaper by at least £100 but was just wondering about this PAYG option. Dunno, I'm confused myself...

Why is car insurance so difficult?

I have had a quote go from £500 to £150 by trying different brokers.... and it was ultimately for the same product from the same underwriter.

Originally posted by mitchja

I've always found that car insurance companies always give new customers better deals. I've never had the same company insure my car for longer than 12 months.

I've found the exact opposite - at last renewal I ran my details via all kinds of sites (including those that cater specifically for my...err...age) and found that my existing insurer couldn't be beat. Mind you, I've probably reached some kind of price floor...

Paul

Certainly one should shop around the brokers (on-line like confused.com or a real-world broker) and the direct companies for traditional car insurance products. However the OP was about PAYG insurance which is a relatively new product and not widely available to brokers, rather than asking about the benefits of shopping around

I often find that my current insurer can offer me a better deal as a new customer than as an existing one. Pain though it is this often means not renewing and then insuring with the same company on line.

Phil FM