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[thenorth] 07/7/2010 09:03

And to further prove my point...

Dated : 29/6/10 at 05:18
Subject: Courtesy Cars - only 23% of motor insurance policies have a courtesy car as a standard benefit
Recent analysis by independent financial research company Defaqto has highlighted significant differences among comprehensive motor insurance policies in relation to courtesy cars and urges consumers to check the detail of their policies to ensure they have the cover they expect.
Analysis shows that if your car is lost or stolen:
o 49% of policies will not provide a courtesy car
o Only 23% of policies offer a courtesy car as standard
o 28% offer a courtesy car if selected as an optional extra at time of purchase
A survey of 5 000 consumers conducted on behalf of Defaqto found that:
o Courtesy car provision is of greater importance to 35 to 44 year olds and particularly for those
with children
o Provision of a 'courtesy car from when you register your claim until it has been settled' and a 'courtesy car while your car is being repaired' both appear in the top 10 most important features among consumers surveyed
o Consumers with a higher level of No Claims Discount place greater importance on guaranteed
availability of a courtesy car provision of a car while theirs is repaired and having a courtesy
car from the time a claim is registered until settlement
Mike Powell Insight Analyst for General Insurance at Defaqto said "When purchasing cover consumers must ensure that they are aware of the provider's courtesy car provision. Finding out that a courtesy car is not available when you need one could be very costly especially if you have to hire a car to continue your day to day activities".

[thenorth] 07/7/2010 08:54

Here you go all...


Dated : 30/6/10 at 08:41
Subject: ABP Club meeting Thatcham - Changes within the Credit Hire market
Steve Evans CEO of Accident Exchange presentation at the ABP Club meeting held at Thatcham earlier this month focused on the influences and changes within the credit hire sector in recent years.
Having been in the credit hire industry for 26 years Steve gave a personal view on how the changes had affected his own business and the market as a whole. He described the insurance market as 'schizophrenic' but said that relationships between CHO and insurers had improved recently with a prevailing mood of 'harmony over conflict'.
Steve said that the CHO industry generates a significant amount of revenue - £500b worth of hiring on the back of claims that are generated from road vehicle accidents. However the recession has been going on for far so long that the majority of people don't know what normal looks like these days which makes it difficult to define what good looks like. "For those of you who don't remember the recession was kicked off on September 15 2008 when Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy said Steve.
Against the gloomy economic backdrop, there has been a 3% reduction of traffic volumes in the UK; 1m more people unemployed are no longer driving to and from work everyday, and there are fewer goods being consumed and so less goods being delivered and consequently there are less accidents. And what accidents there are, are competing for space in a bodyshop market place where the emphasis has been on lean and efficient working so everyone has been stretched financially in the past year or so.
But the complexity of the supply channel deserves some thought. We repair about £4m damage to our own fleet of 5 000 vehicles and despite the fact that people are questioning whether we should be registered as a charity at the moment we are a very viable company and we represent a significant part of a complex eco-system said Steve.
Looking back he said that the credit hire industry saw meteoric growth from around 2001 to 2008. Helphire won a landmark case – Clark v Ardington – and the credit hire industry thrived. Insurers started to realise that consumers were not happy with the provision of budget courtesy vehicles provided and so a massive number of tender documents were released in our market place he said. Initially it was Admiral then Saga Aviva RBS."
The result was that insurer driven credit hire volumes rocketed but Accident Exchange didn't participate because they were engaged elsewhere in a legal challenge which took 12 months to defeat. "As a consequence of what was happening with increased insurer activity it was inevitable that eventually the insurance procurement directors and the insurance claims directors would realise that they were screwing each other. Insurers were getting attractive credit hire commissions but claims costs were rocketing as a consequence. The market created this almighty mud wrestle which produced a relatively unstable environment."
Around the same period the industry started to express concern at the length of time claims were taking to be settled and the next chapter of the credit hire story started to shape up with insurers trying to extricate themselves away from the embarrassment of credit hire commissions at a time when they were struggling to control underwriting costs.
Autofocus
Steve discussed the scale of problems caused to Accident Exchange by the alleged conspiracy of Autofocus whereby dishonest statements were made about Accident Exchange' vehicle hire charges. Steve said that it has probably cost his business around £37m. Autofocus evidence influenced judges to award significantly lower amounts than AE were entitled to. The positive effects of unearthing the Autofocus issue are still emerging but there has been an improvement in the engagement with insurers and solicitors in collecting under-recoveries for spot hire rates without having to progress claims to court. The spat with Auutofocus continues and a Court of Appeal judgement is expected to be handed down shortly.
Steve said that the false allegations also affected their relationship with insurers at the time because insurers slowed down payments to the Group as they possibly expected to benefit from the additional time it would take litigating unpaid claims.
"Sometimes what goes on in a business is not always necessarily the same as public opinion said Steve. Nine months ago we worked hard to re-position the business and cut back funding of our low margin credit repair activities he continued. We decided to move away from insurer referral business and return to our core business where we had long and stable relationships to deliver bespoke customer focused mobility solutions aligned to the brand need of the customer."
Harmony over conflict
Steve said that although around a year ago debtor days were astronomical the situation has changed. "The situation now is that our four big insurer customers are 75-85 percent of the time paying within 90 days. I think that insurers recognise that if people are paid on time then they feel more committed to provide a better level of service." He said that the relationship with insurers now was less adversarial and more harmonious. "Insurers are striking for operational efficiency paying more quickly and there is a more positive more harmonious environment."
In addition he said that the GTA increase of 2.6% for spot hire was one of the easiest to agree of any rate review in the ten years the GTA has existed.
In terms of economic recovery Steve said that we like most of the world can write off the rest of 2010 and most of 2011 but what was important was to align your business so that you emerge from this cycle in a strong position but also to keep an eye on the future and changes that are happening because it is such a dynamic sector. Credit hire still has a role to play either in delivering customer service reducing costs or generating incremental commission activity.

[orchestralis] 06/7/2010 10:53

Are final resuts due this month? They were last July.

[gooddoc] 01/7/2010 17:03

TN

Yes it helps and thank you again for your considered opinion.

I'll keep in mind your further recommendation of DYOR and do just that.

GD

[thenorth] 01/7/2010 16:21

Pleasure Gooddoc

Company fleets I am not 100% sure of but I guess it depends on the car damaged vs. the pool car. in the case of the Audi garage they may well have had an A6 on the forecourt, personally I don't think its right for a tpi to expect a garage to use the 'for sale' vehicle because how would you claim back depreciation etc. as for high net worth people it is common place within the industry to ask the client if they have use of other vehicles, now if the answer is yes then further questions are asked to see if a valid reason can be learned before committing either way. So Henry who has just had his Range Rover sport smashed into may well have another car but it's a Ferrari F40 and simply is not an every day use car and therefore a hire car could be provided.

As I say this is only my understanding of it and I hear ACE have already months ago tightened this potential banana skin up.

Remember we dont much ever get to hear when CHO's win these tyes of battles, they do exsist!

Hope that helps

TN

[gooddoc] 01/7/2010 16:02

Thanks for your view TN.

My concern is I suppose the potential of a wider issue. Could the ruling be construed to mean that CHO's also could not operate with company fleets on the same basis i.e. that it could be proved that suitable pool cars are available. Taken to the extreme, could it mean that high-net-worth customers with potentially multiple cars in the household themselves could fall foul of the new ruling?

GD

[thenorth] 01/7/2010 15:39

Yes I can, shock horror!

It means that I would imagine that most CHO's and ACE included following this case will not hire against vehicles where a motor dealer is the hirer owing to them having access to other vehicles. I would not imagine it would be that many cases but I again would imagine that it would mean ACE having to reduce any outstanding cases of this ilk. Just shows the type of bad business done prior to the change in stance from ACE and i would imagine many other CHO's too.

DYOR as usual...

TN

[gooddoc] 01/7/2010 14:13

I know that this is not new-news but a version of the recent lost court case has just appeared on the Insurance website PostOnline:



Can anyone shed any light on the potential impact of this?

[thenorth] 01/7/2010 09:53

none as yet clond! Yeh i agree i find his posts highly entertaining too!

[clond] 01/7/2010 08:56

No filter i'm afraid - I find it very funny !

peoples postings are unlikely to affect someone holding, buying or selling. Good research first usually helps !

No info on the case ?

[thenorth] 30/6/2010 08:01

Ah and back to the one line answers... just about sums up your understanding and research....

may i suggest to the rest of the thread that this fool goes on filter as the muppet adds nothing of interest or indeed fact to the discussion.

TN

[thenorth] 29/6/2010 22:41

Brainy you are wrong. did you know that the average repair times if you went through your own insurance comapny takes on average 21 days? Did you know that if you wished not to pay your excess and therefore claim direct from the third party insurer, becasue they take so long to inspect the damaged vehicle the repair time goes to 28 days plus. Now if a credit hire company foot the bill for the repair the time is slashed to 14 days... this is a fact and if you cant take my word for it try reading the MFBI report on the subject.

Over Pricey eh??? No in fact ACE, again becasue i have done DD before i invested, give like for like up to 6 years old after this age the client has a duty of care under law to mitigate their loss and therfore have to take a car from a lower catagory. If a better car is gievn as in the case of Darren Bent the daily rental is reduced. Of course the tabloids have missed this very important point. Not great for the company profit margin but it keeps the customer very happy one would imagine. They can not charge more for a vehicle if the car on hire is better than the car that its out on hire against... Oh dear not looking good now Brainy eh???

Litigation is brought about when a insurer digs its heels in and thinks that they can wriggle out of paying the hire bill. So just how many times has an insurer lost a case? On the flip side how many times has a CHO lost? We have had many land mark cases but CHO's are still here. So you could say once again insurers are their own biggest enemy....

C- for content. E+ for effort... try harder Brainy old boy....

Hey your not Honest John are you by any chance???

One final thought there are many rogue garages ripping off people with their cars, there are many builders doing the same, so does that justify taring all tradesman with the same brush? So why are you spouting such uninformed clap trap?
Now before you reply do yourslef a favour (to stop yourself looking more childish and foolish as you currently are)... research the company and the industry because at the moment you are making it so easy for me....

TN

[sir brainy] 29/6/2010 18:25

The business model is allegedly all about ripping off insurance companies by

1. over-extending repair periods and

2. giving victims of accidents over-pricey replacement hire vehicles while their car is being repaired

3. litigation

[thenorth] 29/6/2010 18:18

Err nooo the example you have set above points to either a bad decision by the guilty party insurer to wash their hands and try to leave their insured in the firing line or a misguided bit of journo garbage poorly researched as usual.... either way you are helping confirm what I said about insurers being to blame for most of the cases you are highlighting... of course its easy for you to post one line answers as you obviously have no grasp of the process or the service, just as well you are not a holder here as I would expect you to have carried out DD before you did. So please before you post check your facts son...

PS PP sold out ages ago so just why do you keep posting?
Do you also post on the BP thread warning on how bad pollution is?

Whilst you are at it why don't you send O.B a letter pointing him to the Bhopal disaster killing over 20,000 people...never mind Amoco Cadiz in '78 when a US owned ship ran aground spilling 1.6bb of oil.... I did not see the US companies involved being pulled over the coals as BP are... now that's a much more important and relevant argument don't you think?

TN

[sir brainy] 29/6/2010 17:59

I'll keep'em coming as there are plenty of cases of this terrible business model and unhappy customers/victims every week

[thenorth] 29/6/2010 17:46

YYawn.... this happened to my other half with a PI claim that was claimed against her for an accident that happened just under the magic 3 year rule... in our case we forwarded it on the insurer at the time to deal with together with a covering letter as its why we pay for insurance in the first place, the problem went away....

So how can 'Honest John' say things like mitigate losses when he has no idea to what extent the damage was to the victims vehicle...never mind the comment that the guilty drivers insurance company refused to pay the bill... even if that was the case how bad is it that they in this case the third party insurer have washed their hands of the case and left the driver in line of fire... this simply can not be true, if it was then their would be thousands of similar cases up and down the country coming forward with this type of issue.... Jurno's eh... the mind boggles...

Although I would say that as in most things in life I am sure that there are good and bad CHO's and maybe it is that the CHO did not do the checks to find out who the third party insurer was and instead have forwarded on the bill to the driver, not what I call best practice IMO... either way the insurer would sort this out.

TN

Keep them coming Brainy... I am enjoying this... you make me look good!

[orchestralis] 29/6/2010 08:40

Its very quiet on here nowadays.

[thenorth] 25/6/2010 08:50

Advice headed Dav, i did have a response the the last post but i wont. What is more of a worry is PP sold out ages ago, so why the unspoken one is still here is beyond me....

Agreed 100k sell yesterday did not help much...

TN

[dyfiman] 20/6/2010 22:38

I find it arrogantand delusional that Sir Braidead says he 'tried to advise PP' about ACE. It's a bit like my 83-year-old mum saying she tried to advise Warren Buffett on an investment. Pauly Pilot is in a different league to SB and would laugh like a drain at the so-called advice. Plonker, is what comes to mind. TheNorth, don't give this numpty airtime, please.

[thenorth] 20/6/2010 22:02

Well that's fair Brainy, but please if you find some info out ref ACE and its worthwhile feel free to post even if it is criticism of the company, I do like a balanced view and a balanced debate.

Thanks for the tip and I will take a look, I have some in GSK which I see as undervalued but pays a great dividend every quarter, DYOR as usual.

TN