How many quotes to obtain when shopping around for car insurance

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PoundMan

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Hi folks, I wanted to get some thoughts on how many quotes to obtain when shopping around for car insurance. I have read online that experts generally recommend obtaining at least three to five quotes. Even the CCPC shopping around checklist is formatted for comparison of five different quotes:
https://www.ccpc.ie/consumers/wp-co...Motor-insurance-shopping-around-checklist.pdf

But I'm not sure if five is really enough or not. I'm trying to figure out if there is a sweet spot in terms of number of quotes to obtain, as I want to strike a balance between price reduction and time expenditure. There are so many different insurance providers and brokers in the Irish market, that it takes so long to shop around them all. It literally takes hours of my time and although I admittedly end up with a cheaper deal in the end, I'm wondering if there is a less time consuming way to obtain similar results. It's not like the UK where you can just use two or three of the large price comparison websites.
 
"How long is a piece of string" is the phrase that comes to mind.

What I do is start my "shopping " 30 or so days ahead of my renewal date as most quotes are valid for that timeframe. I then go about getting 2 or maybe 3 quotes on the days I have the time or inclination. No time pressure doing it that way, for me anyway.
 
I have a 20 year old car and stuck with AA for so long as most places wouldn't quote me. This year the renewal was insulting so my (male) friend said to try Itsforwomen.ie
I got my insurance down from €767 to €403 so maybe put this company on your list of quotes?

The only difference with my policy from the old one is open drive is 3rd party fire and theft only and not fully comp. Not a problem for me I rarely drive other peoples cars.
 
For all insurances I always set aside a couple of hours and trawl through all of the main insurers and online broker/aggregators to find the best deal. I've always found it beneficial. I wouldn't restrict it to an arbitrary number like 5 quotes.
 
ClubMan said:
I always set aside a couple of hours and trawl through all of the main insurers and online broker/aggregators to find the best deal.
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@ClubMan I know this is the optimal method for obtaining the absolute best price, and this is what I have been doing for the last few years, but I am finding it more and more challenging each year to dedicate that level of time in one single day and just wondering if there is perhaps a more time efficient methodology that still gets me a better deal.
 
PoundMan said:
just wondering if there is perhaps a more time efficient methodology that still gets me a better deal.
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Use a broker who deals with the widest array of insurers?

I don't think that there's any substitute for spending time doing the leg work but I'm time rich these days and probably value it less than some others so I can afford to spend the time on this.
 
I renewed last week and was shopping around because my renewal had gone up 20% for no reason. I tried a few quotes online and they were all ringing then with their sales pitch. It was quite tedious so I tried Bonkers.ie and got a much better quote for my current
Insures so jumped at it because I was always happy with them.
Worth a shot.
 
Just to note that some companies, eg its4women, charge you for every letter. That could be a letter work requires, a family member needs a named driver experience letter or at the end of the year you want to change to someone else and you need to prove the no claims discount. At €30 per letter the savings over the next quote can be wiped.
 
Aurora said:
my renewal had gone up 20% for no reason.
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In my experience with car and home insurance if your renewal premium jumps you can often get a lower quote even with the same insurer by applying online as a new customer. Go figure...
 
Duddaa said:
Just to note that some companies, eg its4women, charge you for every letter. That could be a letter work requires, a family member needs a named driver experience letter or at the end of the year you want to change to someone else and you need to prove the no claims discount. At €30 per letter the savings over the next quote can be wiped.
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I have never needed a letter like this but good to know thanks! Yes it would add up quickly.
 
I have a spreadsheet that I update from year to year and I systematically work my way through nearly all insurance providers in the thirty days leading up to my renewal, taking note of the quote, excess and any other salient points. For me, it is the same two or three that are in the ballpark year after year.
 
ClubMan said:
In my experience with car and home insurance if your renewal premium jumps you can often get a lower quote even with the same insurer by applying online as a new customer. Go figure...
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That has also been my experience.
My home insurance renewal from Zurich arrived this year and was up €125.
I got new online quotes from Zurich and 3 others.
Zurich was the cheapest and nearly €100 less than renewing my existing policy.
It might have taken 10 minutes for each quote but I saved €100, lots of better things to do with that €100.
 
tallpaul said:
For me, it is the same two or three that are in the ballpark year after year.
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I do pretty much the exact same thing and have found the same results. House insurance I think I have only ever moved back and forth between two providers as they were substantially cheaper. Car insurance varies a bit more (my car and my wife’s so that’s two different risk profiles) but still usually the same three.
 
Dr Strangelove said:
I generally ring up my insurers and spoof them saying I have a quote of about 15% less from a competitor.
My own insurer then generally offers me around 10% less.
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Yeah, I have phoned in the past after getting my renewal and have done better with all insurers, it did not work this year with Allianz anyway. Myself and Ms. Pondent have cars with them and they would not budge on the renewal quote for either of us saying they don’t do that anymore and what they quote is their best price.

For us anyway they were still the cheapest, so happy to stay with them for cars.

Was it just us they would not budge for or has anyone got a better price from Allianz recently by phoning after getting their renewal quote ?
 
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