Hi CCOVICH,
I tried every other insurer in the phone book and all of them when I said that my number is ex-directory and that I don't give it out had no problem in quoting. I'm certainly not castigating Quinn over their products - I didn't get far enough to find out how competitive their quotes are!
My issue is not with junk mail it's with privacy and what companies can legitimately request - maybe I'm being a little philosophical here but my take on this is that my phone number is not relevant to my ability/history to drive a motor car and consequently not relevant to my insurance premium. Why would a legitimate company refuse to quote me over a private phone number - they have my address, my car reg. number and any other number of details that can accurately track me down - why would they need a phone number and why would it be so important to this company that they would put me in the position of being unable to do business with them as a result?!
Secondly, if we continue to acquiesce to demands for personal information we are contributing to a culture where our personal, private information may be readily asked of us. If you have lived in the states you would know what I'm talking about.
As regards the data protection act, there's the opt-in/opt-out clause in that some companies require you to opt out of them sending/sharing/using your information and it's buried in the fine print or in the telephone announcements that many people just skip over - best practice(which is being adopted by more and more companies) is to adopt the opt-in system where you have to consent to them making any other use of your data.