I write to inform you all of the evil of ecar insurers.

They are an "internet only" insurer and primarily only contact people over the internet as I have discovered.

I recently chose them as the new insurer of our family 1.8 ford focus, they seemed like they had a good service - an excellent quotation price along with free breakdown cover - very nice I thought. So I paid the required deposit of £111 on our policy and awaited the documents - which arrived in good time. I also contacted my previous insurer to request proof pf my 1 yr NCB. This took a little while (around a week) but I wasn;t worried as I knew I had 14 days to provide this. So I sent it offabout 8 days after my policy started.

Then today (just over 3 weeks after I started the policy) I received an email to say that my policy had been cancelled. Just as well I checked my email today (I don't do it everyday) otherwise I could have been driving around whilst unisured. So why was my policy cancelled??! Well, apparantley because my NCB proof had arrived too late!!! To add insult to injury they would charge me £36 for the duration of the policy £50 for cancelation and £25 DD set-up fee - in other words they wanted to keep the £111 deposit I had paid.

I received no letters or emails from them to warn they were cancelling - their service is appalling to say the least - I am trying to get some of the deposit back as I never received the "recorded delivery" letter they supposedly sent..

hmmm.....

And lastly in an effort to sort out this whole problem I decided to call them - and was left on hold for 40mins before anyone answered the phone! And even then whilst I tried to sort it out I was continually put on hold - so the total length of the call was well over an hour. What a nice waste of an hour of my life!

Stay clear of this company unless you want to deal with a bunch of muppets that obviously don't give a rats about their customers.!

Good post, highlighting that you get what you pay for! Even with insurance!

I think your post speaks volumes, so I won't comment too much on it. With regards to the 'recorded delivery', this costs companies a lot of money and they rely on your immediate response to the strong worded letter. If you haven't received it or signed for it, then you have no need to worry... they probably haven't sent it or it's been lost in the standard post.

Pay a little extra and get the service you deserve!

It is appalling treatment and surely they can see that this is poor business practice.There must be a Trade body who can intervene and see this is plainly unethical and unreasonable?I will certainly steer well clear of them.I looked at their Customer Review on this website and they actually show up reasonably well at this stage.(early days I know).

Turning to Vic's point,about paying for what you get. I fully understand the trust of that but for the average punter,who doesn't know Adam from Eve,they will inevitably be attracted by price.It would be a needle in a haystack to say 'Oh I will pay a bit more and get some quality cover.You simply don't know,and the likely star performers will be at the top end range of price and out of consideration for people on tight budgets.

What are you going to do about it? i.e. their treatment and robbery of you.

Yes, by the initial stages they do show up quite well. I think the review area of MoneySupermarket should give a good indication over the coming months. To stress that is is only an indication. A lot of people regard 'Value for Money' as being cheap... it's not! It's the opposite. If you look over the review section, there are some with really bad rating in other areas but have selected good value for money lol. It's quite bizarre how people's minds work!!

The cancellation fee is appalling, and they should have telephoned the insured to let him/her know about the impending cancellation. The letter does inform of impending cancellation, but as the insured said, it didn't arrive... I bet my bottom dollar they didn't send it recorded delivery! The cheap companies never do! RE the excessive cancellation fee, the FSA can be contacted on this matter. Although all insurers have until December 2008 to comply with the Treating Customers Fairly (TCF) policy, the £50.00 is way above the average cancellation fee throughout the motor insurance industry. I'd strongly advise this, but only after the insured has it in writing that the £50.00 is a cancellation fee and not split.

Once a policy is cancelled, it's cancelled. It cannot be reinstated, it has to be re-setup again. They would probably waiver the fee if you took another policy out with them, but I don't recommend this.

I appreciate the comment RE: star performers being at the top end of the price range but it isn't always the case. QBE, HSBC, Groupama, Highway, Chaucer are usually within affordable reach and not a great deal more than the direct commercial marketed insurers. These companies can be sought through various intermediaries. Be aware that there may be stringent underwriting with these guys by means of security. They may dictate that you must have a specific alarm/immob. device in order for the vehicle to be covered for theft. This is usually for cars on the higher end of the market, however. I've known some people to refuse absolutely great cover because the likes of Budget, More Than, Swift, ECar have offered them a price as little as £20 less. When I hear about this from people, it makes me cringe, but theres not much by way of educating people. The telephone agent cannot comment on another insurer's practice, but can only highlight the basis of cover and the differences. Sadly, once somebody has it in their mind that they are going with the cheapest price, there's no stopping them! Whilst it's affordable to do so now, the full protection available isn't there; in turn potentially costing the insured more in the long run.

These shoddy companies reflect the industry in a very bad light. The insurance industry has bad press regardless because people only remember the claims that haven't been paid out, and not the high majority billions that are. It's human nature, we don't remember the dog that saved somebody's life as much as we remember one that took a life away.

Ho hum. Onward and upwards? lol

Hi there,
I'm wondeing if anybody can help me or give me some advice.
I took out an insurance policy with Ecar insurance in September 2007, i arranged to pay them monthly by Direct Debit on the 15th of each month. In January 2008 my direct debit for ecar was returned by my bank and therefore i defulted on a payment. As soon as i found out i emailed ecar (because you can't phone them) and was told if i paid my policy in full by the 5th February 2008 they wouldn't cancel my car insurance.
I then on the 4th February made full payment to ecar of £128 and they then sent me a reciept in the post.
I just happened to need to check my policy online for my policy number and could see that my actual car insurance was showing as a status of cancelled. I emailed ecar immediately to see why my policy was showing as cancelled and the response i had was this;-

Dear .............,
Thank you for your email.
Your policy EC1239816RID was paid for by direct debit you paid a 15%
deposit of £57.57 and 9 equal monthly payments. because one of those
direct debits defaulted the policy was cancelled on 5/2/2008. You were
sent a letter on 29/1/2008 informing that the policy would be
cancelled in 7 days.There was no mention of the £128 i paid them so i sent them another email with proof from my bank statement that i had paid and also attached emails from a Mike Stephens an employee at Ecar telling me how to make my payment.I am still waiting a response from ecar and i don't know what to do, i'm so angry as i've been driving with no car insurance for almost 3 months even though i have made full payment. I can't drive my car because i'm not insured and i don't know if i can buy another policy. If anyone has any ideas on what i can do please let me know. I contacted the Financial Ombudsman Service but they were really no help.Thanks in advance

DO NOT USE THIS COWBOY OUTFIT!!!!!!!

i had a months insurance with them and cancelled the pay as you go in time, but a week later i had an email confirming a card transaction! they took another months worth out of my account and they will not reply to my emails and if you try to call the phone number on 118 it is premium £1.50 per minute from a mobile and all calls are redirected back to the web site and no one answers! i read about this company being like this and thought id be ok just for a month but cant believe it........serioulsy either pay a bit more for your insurance or just simple DONT USE THIS COMPANY NOT GOOD.

I read with some interest the posting above. I have recently used ecar insurance and like Tarquin Krikery I have received my documentation within days of paying for an annual policy. I took the time to read the letter which accompanied the letter and saw that it stated quite clearly that the policy would be cancelled if certain documentation was not received within 21 days.

The documents requested were proof of No Claims Bonus being claimed and a copy of my drivers licence. The first request is quite normal in the car insurance industry.

I fail to understand the difficulty in supplying this document within the stated period. The invitation from your previous insurer clearly states your level of No Claims Bonus and whether it is protected or not. That suffices for proof of your NCB. There should be no need to ask your former company for additional proof. if you do not understand the system use a broker.

Ecar Insurance makes it clear on its website that it is an internet based company and does not have any call centres. If you are not prepared to scan your documents into your computer and send them by e-mail, then by all means do not use them. The do, in fact, for those without scanners enclose a self addressed envelope for sending the necessary documents to them

However, if you are not prepared to use the internet to communicate, do not blame them. Instead remain with a call centre based insurance company or use a broker

The people at the other end of the phone are not there to answer your queries. That can be done by e-mail. If you do not like the internet please keep your ear to the phone and stay with the call centre based companies

Beware indeed of eCar Insurance (so-called)

Let me just list off my recent experiences with bunch of pirate

The internet site crashes constantly if you want to make ammendments to your policy - no doubt the sales side operates fine though as soon as you require some after sale service there are glitches all over the place that make the site crash all the time and is often off line all together - i wanted to change my insurance details but the site just kept crashing and saying to phone this number that costs £2 A MINUTE if you want to contact them!!

They have taken a large ammount of money off me, they havnt handled a claim I put in nearly SEVEN MONTHS ago leaving me with no car in the mean time and now they are dragging there feet (obviously) when it comes to re-embursing me as I paid a year in advance and have only recieved 3 months worth of cover.

£2 a minute if you want to speak to someone (after sales) the web site is useless and is the only other means of contaacting these people.

Now I am being sued by another insurance company because ecar ahvnt handled the claim yet and it seems they have passed that responsibility onto another company that is equally as unhelpful CLAIM247.

If you go with ecar and you find yourself in a position where you need to make a claim you will have a year long nightmare before you get any money!

Thats my experience! - I hope some of you can learn from it.

Hi, I recently took out a policy with ecar insurance for my BMW, I chose them for the same reasons as anybody, they were reasonably priced! The fact that they were an internet based company didn't worry me.... until they asked me to send a copy of my licence. I was told by a previous letter that i had 23 days in which to send these documents, I sent these off promptly (roughly 3 days after recieving this letter) and then recieved a letter several days later stating that they had not recieved it in time and had subsequently cancelled my insurance. I have now been contacting them since the middle of September to find out what they were playing at but to this day I have still had no reply whatsoever. Moving on from this, I was shocked to see that even though they had cancelled my policy in September, they STILL withdrew the funds from my bank for the October month???? To say I am angry is a massive understatement! I am still trying to contact these guys but the longer this "awkward silence" goes on, i can't help but feel a bit wary that these guys aren't actually governed by the FSA?

To summarise, they hook you in with cheap quotes, give you deadlines - then say you exeeded them even though you may not have, steal your money and ignore your queries!

I really hope these guys fall before more innocent drivers get caught in this giant financial spider's web!

Regards All,

Luke R

Ok i need help. Today I chose to use ecar for my insurance because they were the cheapest, i was in a rush because im going to pick up my car tomorrow so i never checked the company out. They took a deposit for £342 but now im regretting using them after reading reviews on the internet! what should i do?

RedBlack:Ok i need help. Today I chose to use ecar for my insurance because they were the cheapest, i was in a rush because im going to pick up my car tomorrow so i never checked the company out. They took a deposit for £342 but now im regretting using them after reading reviews on the internet! what should i do?

I would not worry too much. The company are members of the Association of British Insurers and you have the protection of the FSA and the Financial ombudsman Service.

It appears that the people who have had problems are those where documents have not been received by Ecar. This can be an issue with these internet based companies. They don't always have the staff required to deal with all the admin and customer services can be frustrating.

I would go with them for the year if they are cheaper and judge them by your own experience.

Huckster