A frugal life is an easy life!

Axa car insurance (using the Swift cover insurance company) are unable to explain their own policies.

Had our first ever bump at the weekend.
Car was recovered to a holding centre, claim submitted.

Paying for No Claims Discount (NCD) cover also (£60 per year) which was then dropped to 4 years from 19 years in the policy renewal for the next 12 months.
This has resulted in premiums that have now gone over £160 per month as opposed to the £65 per month previously offered.

Contacting Axa insurance today, some simple questions put to them that they were unable to explain.

* Why has our NCD dropped to just 4 years when we paid for it to be protected?
- This is because two claims are currently open on the policy, a no fault claim from 8 months ago remains open and is going to court (previous discussions resulted in a £10 per month increase while this is ongoing, from £55 to £65 per month) and the bump you had at the weekend.
With two claims open on the policy, this is classed as the second claim, which has resulted in your no claims dropping from 19 years (40% policy discount) to 4 years (28% policy discount).

* If this is really the reason, then the policy should have increased by 12% (which is the difference between 19 years NCD at 40% discount and 4 years NCD at 28% discount an increase of 12%) instead Axa have DOUBLED the price of next years' premium, an increase of 100%, why?
- The advisor then proceeded to go through the rigmarole of how NCD works. I repeated the question, still got no answer.

* Why have axa only supplied a courtesy car for 14 days, when the insurance document states that "while repairs are being carried out we will provide a courtesy car"?
- This is because it is with our salvage team (Copart UK) after suffering substantial damage, with a view to declaring your car a "total loss"
They will check your car to see if it can be repaired and if it is repairable then we will provide a courtesy car while those repairs are carried out.
* I'm not happy with a salvage company that works "with" axa (and auctions off insurance write-offs) being the "experts" that judge whether a car can be repaired or not, as they have a clear financial interest in writing off vehicles.
- no answer

The rest of the conversation was a complete fob-off from axa.

Totally devoid of any answers and passing the buck to their claims team, which is conveniently "closed until tomorrow" and only open limited hours.

What's becoming apparent, is that insurance companies are writing off cars when they can be repaired, as pay out is better than dealing with a repair and providing a courtesy car.
Problem is, it took us ages to find this car and we had to jump through proverbial hoops to get it, this combined with exceptionally genuine low-mileage, makes it well worth keeping.