Just taken insurance on new Octavia and paid £36 extra for legal expenses

Whilst looking through brochure i came across the 3 years free Skoda Ensurance ( this was not explained to me at the dealers) so i registered with them and noticed that they include legal cover so it seems i now have two lots of legal cover.

Contacted dealers asking ig the legal cover offered by Ensurance is on a par with that supplied by insurance companies and why i wasnt advised about Ensurance at point of sale .Not had a reply so far.

Has anyone else had info ?

I got an email about 3 weeks after taking delivery of the car. I did sign up & as I don't have legal expenses cover saw that it was part of the Ensurance package.

If you search these threads for Ensurance you will see that many think it's OK, but others don't for whatever reason.

I would expect your insurance company would make a charge if you changed your cover. My dealer also didn't mention it, but it is on Skoda website. I suspect it will fall on deaf ears at the dealers. I doubt the extra cost from your ins company will be huge, so maybe just remember at renewal to decline cover.

Ensurance are simply claims handlers.  They will deal with your insurance claim in a similar way to your own insurers but they will of course make a profit in doing so.  Their profit will be charged to the responsible persons insurance and as such the cost of the claim to the industry as a whole will be far higher.  That will obviously contribute to higher premiums for all motorists.   

 

I wouldn't sign up as in the case of an accident, your own insurers will probably want to assign their own approved claims handlers and you'd be bombarded with companies offering similar services.  There's so much money involved in this business that lots of insurers offer you incentives to use their handlers such as waiving the excess on your policy. Others simply try top force you into using their preferred company.

 

I would never do it as all ensurance do is liaise between with your insurers and their insurers and cream off a fortune for themselves.    Inevitably this will increase the time and money involved in each claim. I'd urge anyone with an interest in keeping claims costs down not to use these companies

.

Ensurance are simply claims handlers. They will deal with your insurance claim in a similar way to your own insurers but they will of course make a profit in doing so. Their profit will be charged to the responsible persons insurance and as such the cost of the claim to the industry as a whole will be far higher. That will obviously contribute to higher premiums for all motorists.

I wouldn't sign up as in the case of an accident, your own insurers will probably want to assign their own approved claims handlers and you'd be bombarded with companies offering similar services. There's so much money involved in this business that lots of insurers offer you incentives to use their handlers such as waiving the excess on your policy. Others simply try top force you into using their preferred company.

I would never do it as all ensurance do is liaise between with your insurers and their insurers and cream off a fortune for themselves. Inevitably this will increase the time and money involved in each claim. I'd urge anyone with an interest in keeping claims costs down not to use these companies

.

This isn't all Skoda ensurance do. They also cover any extra costs your insurance refuse to cover relating to not using your insurances repairer and using a Skoda approved on instead.

They are also like night and day to M&S or direct Line and unlike M&S I've not been constantly hounded by 3rd party "solicitors" to sue for whiplash, emotional distress etc.

I'm on the phone at the moment so can't find everything but I'll try and post more when I get home but I'd suggest the OP read my "lorry versus vrs" thread. I personally would recommend them.

As for legal cover. My experience is it's not worth the paper it's written on. I had it and when asking about pursuing the lorry driver who hit me I was told if it's not cost effective to contest they wouldn't bother.

Edited 20 February, 201412 yr by gullyg

Gah - can't edit my own post.

 

Here is the important bit, as far as I was concerned,

 

 

 

 

Working alongside your main motor insurance policy, Ensurance

guarantees your vehicle will be repaired at an approved

repairer, by ŠKODA trained technicians using genuine ŠKODA

parts and paints – no matter who your motor insurance is with.

And if this costs anymore than your motor insurance provider is

willing to pay, we’ll pay the difference – at no cost to you.

 

 

http://www.skoda-ensurance.co.uk/assets/documents/SkodaEnsuranceCoverBooklet.pdf

 

 

This for me is a major benefit as when I had to use Direct Line for a repair on my Fabia it took 5 weeks, wasn't done right and I was messed about badly (the forgot to order parts, claimed wrong parts had been sent out multiple times etc).

 

When myself and SWMBO were rear ended at the start of the year Marks and Spencer were ok-ish getting her a hire car but refused to arrange to have me put on the insurance even though I was a named driver over 21 etc etc etc.  We are also still getting phone calls from some solicitor or other asking us if we suffered whiplash as claiming we could be "owed thousands of pounds".  They even used Arnold Shark as a repair centre.

 

In comparison, so far Skoda Ensurance has given me a single point of contact at a geographical number and have been very good - so far anyway.  The thread with my comments is here,

http://www.briskoda.net/forums/topic/300614-lorry-versus-vrs/

 

Edited 20 February, 201412 yr by gullyg

Motor legal policies are a rip off. Ive just signed up to http://www.freemotorlegal.co.uk/

Sign up once thats it save at least £25 a year/policy. Hope I never need it anyway!!

Lee

Edited 21 February, 201412 yr by morty

Just be careful using the service if your claiming on your own insurance as it will increase the cost of the claim you have to declare next time your shopping for insurance