Insurers have a multitude of shared data on various anti-theft and anti-fraud registers, and in many cases, they already know the answer to the question. For example, "have you had any previous accidents". At a click of a mouse they get a list of every claim/accident related thing ever relating to your name, similar names, your address, your post code, similar addresses, your car reg no., and ditto details of anyone sharing your address, etc. etc.

Oddly, they can (seemingly) refrain from ever clicking that button for many years, and take your money, if you never have a claim. But the minute anything happens the information will miraculousy become known.

Of course they would say they never check in advance as they should be able to trust you, and if you misdeclared that's your fault. Sounds like utter bollox to me.

Cod'ead is confusing declaring something, as opposed to giving a false answer to a direct question. There is a difference between not volunteering information and lying. FWIW I wouldn't declare it either, but in this case the insurmountable problem is the previous refusal which as has been pointed out, all insurers already know about. Funny, that.

I have done both. two comparisons sites, 3 direct online applications to different companies and 4 calls to companies. Out of that only one would insure me.

Did you speak to a real live person at Swiftcover?
I've been with them for years and always found them easy to deal with.

Yes i did and they told me that they could not renew because they had new underwriters and had changed their policies.

You can't deny it, but you can dispute that it should be on the database at all.

According to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974:

[i(2) Subject to the provisions of any order made under subsection (4) below, where a question seeking information with respect to a person’s previous convictions, offences, conduct or circumstances is put to him or to any other person otherwise than in proceedings before a judicial authority—

(a) the question shall be treated as not relating to spent convictions or to any circumstances ancillary to spent convictions, and the answer thereto may be framed accordingly; and

(b) the person questioned shall not be subjected to any liability or otherwise prejudiced in law by reason of any failure to acknowledge or disclose a spent conviction or any circumstances ancillary to a spent conviction in his answer to the question.[/i

Have a look through the [url=http://www.unlock.org.uk/xoffenders.aspx?sid=258Unlock[/url site, specifically the detailed guide. As they put it:
[iUnder the ROA, once the ‘rehabilitation period’ is completed the conviction is ‘spent’ and no longer needs to be disclosed when applying for insurance.  For the purposes of insurance, “the broad effect of the Act ….is to relieve any proposer for insurance of the obligation to disclose a conviction or even the fact that he had committed the crime.”[/i

The ROA allows the individual to interpret the question of convictions in their own favour, but with the backing of government legislation.

I'd challenge Swiftcover and request that any record of your spent conviction and consequently the denial of cover be removed from the national database and if they refuse, threaten legal action and quote the ROA. I think they'd struggle in a court to back up their case.

That's not very practical. Swiftcover don't run the national databases for one thing. More to the point, any such challenge would either fall at the first hurdle or, for obvious reasons, be appealed all the way by the insurance industry. Unless you are a millionaire how would you fund the sort of costs involved and how much would you be prepared to risk taking them on?

Also politically, the motor insurers pretty much have the government in their pocket just now. Trying to achieve anything that might be seen as anti-insurer / pro-convicted motorist would not go down well. There would be zero appetite for anything that insurers could spin as being in any way helpful to fraud or dishonesty.

Finally, the obvious objection to such a court case would be that it is not in any way illegal for insurers to hold such data which is simply factual. What they cannot do, in the case of a spent conviction, is take it into consideration.

They don't run it, but they clearly have access to amend people's details. It would take them very little to remove a tick from a box or send an email to resolve something that is proving detrimental to DG's noble quest for fair insurance. He might even have a case for data protection.

He could always ask the [url=http://www.askmid.com/Motor Insurance Database[/url directly. Impractical or not, it's worth a try if it saves him several hundred quid a year and problems in the future. If the MID say no, he needs to ensure the spent conviction isn't used against him as per the ROA legislation. That might be impossible as we all know they will almost certainly use that information, which is why it should be escalated and challenged if at all possible.

You're mad anyway, there's no talking to you.

But even if they did have access, they aren't going to amend anything just by request, are they? Would completely defeat the object. Data protection is a non-starter IMHO as the data is (they would argue) held for a permissible reason.


No, that is just a search engine to find out if a car was insured on a given date. It is nothing to do with the databases that record anti-fraud etc info.


Well, at the risk of losing my house, I wouldn't say it was worth a try, but yes, he might.


But I already outlined the cheap and cheerful way he could do that, if it happened that he had reason to believe information had been used contrary to ROA. No need to break the bank.


One tries

Car insurance is a total rip off. A few weeks ago my daughter had an accident, for which the other party's insurance have admitted full and complete liability.

My daughter's car has been declared a write off. So far so good.

Her car was 7 weeks old with 1,200 miles on the clock and has a list price of £8,500 and came with other add-ons like 5 year warranty, 3 years free servicing and roadside recovery etc

So I was expecting a "new for new" offer from the other party's insurers. They phoned yesterday to offer £5,100 ! Of course I told them to stick it where the sun don't shine and asked them if they could tell me where I could buy a 7 week old car with all of the additional benefits for that price as I'd buy 2 ! I also reminded them of their legal obligation to offer a value which would enable an equivalent age and condition vehicle to be purchased as a replacement. The chap went very quiet then blustered a bit before finally saying he'd need to refer the matter to an assessor. "No problem" I said "take as long as you like. You're already paying for a hire car costing you £300 a week plus storage costs of the written off car so it's entirely your own money you're wasting. You'll continue to incur those costs until you make me a sensible offer and the claim can be closed so quite frankly I don't care if you take 6 months". He mumbled something about Glass's Guide prices to which I simply said that Glass's prices were trade 'buy in' prices and not 'sell out' prices.

Half an hour later they phoned back and offered a no quibble offer of full list price. So their offer went from £5100 to £8500 in 30 minutes. I wonder how many people they rip off like that who aren't able or prepared to stand up for themselves ?

I'd imagine they do it every time in the hope that people won't have the balls to questions it. A lot of people unfortunately will just accept what they say and take the offer.

They did the same with my mate, but he works for Aviva so was wise to it. He then printed off I don't know how many different car adverts of similar make/model and age to show that the offer was ridiculous and he received the right amount.

What most people neither know nor care is that this government, which is right in the pockets of the motor insurers, is on the brink of effectively removing the ability of most innocent victims of accidents to claim, unless they pay. The insurers of course are rubbing their hands, and they repeatedly insist that you can TRUST THEM to settle up fair and square with every person, every time, why involve independent legal advice, you don't need it.

They say this with a straight face. It is a pity that basically nobody in the country gives a sh?t about the proposed decimation of the present arrangements, but what baffles me is how [ianybody[/i would think that the paying party (the insurer you're claimin against) can be trusted to offer you the best deal immediately, when (a) "don't accept the first offer" has become part of the language and lore for a reason and (b) they have a legal duty to their shareholders to pay out as little as possible.

There was an interesting program on C4 Dispatches, which just opened a tiny window on some of the scams insurers use on an endemic basis. Think it's repeated this Friday.

Yes, plus the fact that most companies ask you for a car value when you request a quote. They use that value in their premium calculations but then disregard it when dealing with claims. Effectively they are charging people to insure for a value that they do not acknowledge which is another nice little scam for them.