This one wasn't but I remember a couple of years it was and when I rang up to ask them to price match (as per their ad at the time) they actually said that they couldn't as they weren't on the list of approved competitors
Mine hasn't really gone up with the same provider the last couple of years. I'm sticking with them because they were excellent when a car ran into the back of me and wrote mine off.
I usually phone my current insurer and say I’ve had a quote for around £50 less than the cheapest quote that I’ve actually seen. They usually match it without hesitating.
Even if it doesn't go up, always do a comparison and then phone them and tell them you are leaving because you've found it cheaper (you don't actually have to leave if you really don't want to, it takes quite a few questions to get to that point so you can very easily bluff it). They will price match 90% of the time and will at least lower it significantly the other 10%. I stayed with Admiral for 9 years because they kept price matching and I was actually gutted to leave them on the 10th when they couldn't match, although they were prepared to knock £100 off the renewal quote it was still more expensive than the cheapest.
Also, I say this every time but don't forget to check how much cashback you can get from a provider such as Quidco or TopCashback too. Literally free money.
Admiral were a joke for me a year or so back. Changed my car and they wanted £80 for the additional 3 months, ok i'd already paid for 12 months on teh old car so couldn't do much, but I'd checked the comparison sites the day I looked at the new car and they were about £310 for the year, roughly £40 up on my old car. Come the insurance renewal they quote £495. Did a check on a couple of comparison sites and I could get about £250 ish (can't remember exactly), phoned Admiral about the renewal quote and asked them if they'd been drinking when they prepared it, got the usual guff about not wanting to lose me and they could do something and offered me £416, am I interested? Erm no! Went elsewhere this year got my insurance down to £220 with £35 cashback through Quidco. Flip to this is we still use Admiral for the House and my Wifes Car insurance where they are competitive( My wife runs a business from home which rules out a lot of the real cheap offers, as does the 7.5k claim that we put through against Admiral to fix the En -Suite shower!!)
I worked for Direct Line Group for 6 months last year. Got the impression they were very good at dealing with claims and getting customers paid out as quickly as they could. Seemed like it was almost a competition by the claims handlers/assessors to turn things round in hours. There were regular posts on the company Yammer network (corporate social network) on same day payout often within a few hours. It really contrasted the experience I had with AXA when my car was stolen and they tried everything and anything not to pay me out and they dragged it out for 9 months. They definitely seemed focused on customer service. Was impressed. Anyway, I guess I'm saying if they weren't a lot more I'd choose them in future for car insurance etc.
