As title. Bennetts coming up cheapest this year, but heard they are known to hide stuff in the small print to catch people out and get out of paying up. Now I'm not planning on crashing or having my bike stolen, so are they worth a punt or are they nobbers?
I was with benefits when I had a off last year,i had to do all the work myself as they didn't want to pay £99 to get all the witness info from the police. On the plus side, they didn't have a problem paying out
It's another marmite one. When I wrote off the Ducati, Bennetts were as good as gold. The assessor even phoned me to commend me on the condition of the bike and that he was distraught at having to write it off. The handled the personal injury claim against me with one phone call, and when I called them to insure the Blade, probably by dumb luck, the guy I spoke to had had a similar accident to me and was genuinely interested in my new bike and fell over himself to be helpful. And yet, I hear genuine horror stories from others who use them. I have a mate who has always sworn by the service and value for money he gets from Hastings, but just yesterday I was with somebody who was spitting flame over trying to change their policy with them. Seems to me that with insurance you just rolls the dice...
As above good and bad reviews of most insurance companies. I was with Bennetts when I had my off. No big issues with them paying out.
Thanks guys. I'll go with them then. There's no big differences in price, but their excess was much lower than everyone else's.
One thing though mate. They are very finicky about reporting all mods, even stupid trivial ones. Best have a look at their list of 'performance enhancements in their small print.
I agree with both of Ken's post. Bennetts were fine and paid out quick when I wrote my bike off, but they are finnicky over mods. Next year's renewal will be a lot higher so make sure you cancel the auto renew they try and put on a policy. They have been taken over by Saga since I was last with them and so their policies may have changed. Top tip for insurers who play silly buggers is to go to the ombudsman. Last I knew it cost £500 for each case and the insurer has to pay the fee. If you are arguing over a few hundred they normally pay up at the threat of this as it is cheaper, especially as the Ombudsman tends to be more considerate of the client.
Well I'm off to a good start, sort of... I played them off via a comparison site and hit the Buy button, but when it transferred me to the Bennetts site it didn't include the NCB protection which I had previously selected. So I added NCB protection on the Bennetts site and the quote went up, buggers!!! I even went back to check and it was indeed stated as included on the comparison site. No worries I thought, it's only another tenner, but as I went through my details they had my NCB as 1 year less and my old home address. After bumping my NCB back up to 6 years, correcting my address (to apparently a safer area) and adding my BikeSafe certificate which their site had also mysteriously forgotten that I had mentioned, the quote went below what it was in the first place. It just seems that the Bennetts site is not in tune with the comparison site and loads of stuff doesn't transfer properly and messes with the quote. Luckily it all worked out in the end Lets hope that's the only problem I'll have as it turns out I'll be underwritten by AXA anyway.
Try BeMoto. Proper motorcycle broker, run by bikers for bikers. Just sorted my renewal out. Existing premium. £910, BeMoto £460. I dealt with Nick one of the directors. 01733 907000
Heard horror stories about Bennetts too. Got my renewal for the Street R yesterday with Bikesure (Adrian Flux) gone up a fair bit since last year to £361 and they are going to try to auto renew!!! No fecking chance. Got a quote just before the weekend with CN and they are happy to insure the Street R (with extras) AND the CBR1000F for £285! Guess where I'll be going?
Be very careful with auto renew, when I took out a policy with them I asked to not be automatically renewed. Roll on a year and a letter fell through my door congratulating me on renewing with them! It had gone up ridiculously, it was over £150 more than the new policy I had taken out elsewhere! Robbing bastards.
I can confirm that whilst Hastings Direct are cheap for a new Policy, they will try and Rape U mid term should U change your Bike.
Not a problem many of us will ever have mate. Phoned CN yesterday as I wanted to compare quotes with Bikesure and when the guy heard them mentioned he said 'can you hang on a little?' when he came back he said 'how about if I reduce the quote to £250.85?' so I bought it there and then. Not bad at all £250 for 2 bikes worth £7500!
I'm with Bennetts, got my renewal through the door and they are cheaper than the quotes off the comparison sites by a fair bit, only £98 full comp, so I will be staying with them for another year. Devitts and Andrian Flux are 2 I will avoid in the future though, had bad experiences with both
