A stonking £190 for 12 month Relay cover. Rang retentions, and they offered me £99 which is the new member offer rate.
They wouldn't match the cashback website rates (which are 50% cashback) but being a Gold member there are odd additional benefits like free 48 hour overseas cover which is useful for shopping trips, and key insurance.
I hate buying insurance for things I can afford to cover myself; the AA is a convenience thing. I've had two recoveries in 16 years, plus a new bit of radiator hose fitted and a new windscreen wiper motor fitted.
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Green Flag might suit your needs or check this list from Moneysavingexpert
www.moneysavingexpert.com/car-insurance/breakdown-cover
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I use AutoAid (recommended in MSE forum). £39/year then you pay for recovery and claim back from them. Not used them so far.
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That is a lot of money.
However, I was once recovered from a Motorway without any form of cover, that was stonking chunk of change as well, and I bet that hasn't gone down.
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I'm a gold member and my renewal is early December (not sure if that inflates prices). They always they and palm me off with renewals of £135-£150 and always manage to pay between £70-£80 for the 12 months.
This is for Roadside and Relay single membership. Like MM its convenience and I like the fact I have been with the AA since 2002.
I have used them 4 times, a tow home from a clutch failure, a broken exhaust bodged at roadside, broken throttle cable again bodged at roadside and a fuel run out.
Happy to pay that much every year for peace of mind. I do wonder if the free AA membership included in the Halifax Ultimate Reward allows you to be a continuous member?
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I'm covered by the AA - any vehicle including all the bikes. I used them to recover the scoot the day of the crash. It costs me £25.00 per month on my Bank Account but I do get mobile phone insurance ( 2x Smartphone) and any other phone I own, Free worldwide travel insurance and also Identity fraud protection & Credit Rating Monitoring. Makes that a bargain !
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>> I was once recovered from a Motorway without any form of cover, that was stonking chunk of change as well, and I bet that hasn't gone down.
I was recovered earlier this year, about thirty miles on a Sunday evening.
I'm with Autoaid and was surprised the cost was roughly equivalent to three years premiums - only £120! The truck had to come around thirty miles to me and then return sixty miles to its base.
I reckon there can't be much profit in that game when you consider the cost of the vehicle, its base depot charges, driver's wages and fuel.
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Every year now, for the last few years I wince at the AA renewal letter that comes through my letter box. I have almost the full works and am a Gold member with Associate membership for my partner.
This year I was invited to renew for somewhere in the region of £255 but I always immediately get on the phone and complain and threaten to leave and this resulted in a drop to £206. I do this with all my services when invited to renew and that include car insurance etc. i suppose I shouldn't have to do this in and ideal world but so what - have to swallow my pride.
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>>and was surprised the cost was roughly equivalent to three years premiums - only £120
I am surprised. I was recovered from Langley to Maidenhead in a Lancia Beta in the 80s and it was more than that then!
In fact, I seem to remember it was actually about that amount which is outrageous considering it was 30 years ago.
And it was the late 80s when I had a Cavalier [I had recently reversed at about 50mph into a JCB) recovered from the A33 nr Basingstoke to Caversham which cost about 90 quid.
Maybe they just see me coming.
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>>
>> I hate buying insurance for things I can afford to cover myself; the AA is
>> a convenience thing. I've had two recoveries in 16 years, plus a new bit of
>> radiator hose fitted and a new windscreen wiper motor fitted.
>>
I know you'd have to pay full whack, but can't you join the AA at the roadside and they'll still come out to you?
If it's a once every few years thing then it would be worth it.
Incidentally, the cost of these things is incredibly small - the Mitsubishi Assistance Plan on daughter's Colt is renewed as part of every service and it's the full pan-European cover with hire car etc etc. Service Manager told me it costs him £20. I saw the same figure in a Vauxhall advert recently where it listed the value of each benefit on one of their finance schemes.
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>>I know you'd have to pay full whack, but can't you join the AA at the roadside and they'll still come out to you?
Yes, but you go to the bottom of the queue. Sometimes the queue has no bottom and they take no non-customers.
I reckon £100 isn't very expensive.
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We use:-
tinyurl.com/lrkwzyp
Full cover, inc. continental, but now are family are returning to the UK will downgrade on renewal to exclude European Cover.
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Autonational Rescue - £165 for 4 cars, full assistance/recovery. Homestart thrown in for nothing.
I've used them twice. Once to be recovered 150 miles, once for a roadside clutch actuating rod bodge.
I don't think they have any actual recovery vehicles themselves, they just contact the nearest provider available. The man who turned out for the clutch repair was AA, and he hammered a washer into a cup-shape on the pavement and adapted an ordinary bolt.
Excellent service.
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I'd rather have me covered than my car!
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>> I'd rather have me covered than my car!
>>
I don't care about being covered in someone elses's car. But I do want to recover any of my own cars while they are being driven by one of the named drivers.
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Suzuki new car recovery is 12mths, Honda was 3 yrs - both ran out in the Spring. In addition I bought a 13yr old Forester.
Decided Green Flag would maybe be worth the beans (I think was 80-90quid to cover me and Mrs Lygonos for any car that we are in).
Funnily enough needed to use it 2 months later to recover the Foz after the brakeline popped - 28 mile recover on a Sunday would have been nippy I'm sure.
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If you find you rarely need the services of a breakdown service. I recommend 'Autoaid'. So long as you know you have a means of paying the breakdown company at the time of an incident and can be bothered to fill in a simple form after, then you'll save a few quid.
I've used them a couple of times. Called their 24 hour helpline where they organise a reptuable local company to come out to you.
Sent claim form off and both times cheques arrived well within 14 days.
No connection to the company, just a satisfied customer/budget conscience motorist!
www.autoaidbreakdown.co.uk
Nial
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The AA just works, so do as MM did and it's still value for money. Strictly, we don't even need it, since both Volvo and MB offer roadside assistance for cars serviced by their dealers as ours are, but the AA has been there when we've needed it and a hundred quid and a phone call is trivial in the overall cost of running two cars.
Green Flag, the one time I did need it in my company car days, didn't come and won't get a second chance. (That was in 1998; call it an irrational exclusion if you like.) The idea of relying on a call centre to find me a local garage, which I then have to pay and claim...er, no thanks.
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I've stayed with Britannia Rescue in spite of their takeover by Liverpool Victoria and the withdrawal of free life cover to Brit Rescue pensioners.....which I am.
I get a 20% staff discount which means me spouse and me are both covered for any car we drive. They call it personal cover. I pay about £70.
They use contractors, mostly the same people as all the other schemes apart from RAC/AA.
Ted
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We have had Green Flag with our Natwest Gold account for a couple of years, it is £12 pcm and offers many other benefits that we use such as worldwide travel insurance, free national trust passes and parking, multiple smartphone insurance, with a joint account, both are covered for everything which makes it a bargain.
Sadly it has since been replaced with a £15 not-so-good scheme for new customers.
I have used it 3 times for a flat battery and they were excellent and fast to send an agent*, but I suspect wouldn't be so good as AA or RAC at making a roadside repair.
www.natwest.com/personal/adgold/g2/car-breakdown-cover.ashx
*if they take longer than an hour to arrive, you get £10.
Last edited by: sooty tailpipes on Fri 12 Jul 13 at 23:02
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>>
>> Incidentally, the cost of these things is incredibly small - the Mitsubishi Assistance Plan on
>> daughter's Colt is renewed as part of every service and it's the full pan-European cover
>> with hire car etc etc. Service Manager told me it costs him £20.
>>
>>
Same with Ford and Mercedes, and others too, I'm sure. I can't understand why some people automatically get this, yet still pay extra for duplicate AA cover? Money to burn?
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>> Same with Ford and Mercedes, and others too, I'm sure. I can't understand why some
>> people automatically get this, yet still pay extra for duplicate AA cover? Money to burn?
>>
I have aMerc and there are, I think, 4 different schemes that MB have depending on when the car was first registered. They all tend to have pretty limited cover once the car is more than 3yrs old.
The manufacturer which doesn't offer anything like this, much to my surprise, is VW. It never occured to me to ask when buying the car and I assumed it would be covered for at least 3yrs. No such luck - one year only.
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How very stupid of VW, especially when Skoda gives the full 3 years on cheaper, mechanically identical cars.
It's amazing, isn't it, how often otherwise rational human beings can reach stupid collective decisions when they wear suits and sit round a table.
Last edited by: Avant on Sun 14 Jul 13 at 17:00
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>> How very stupid of VW, especially when Skoda gives the full 3 years on cheaper,
>> mechanically identical cars.
>>
What threw me is we were changing from a SEAT and that came with 5yrs cover. It needed it too!
>> It's amazing, isn't it, how often otherwise rational human beings can reach stupid collective decisions
>> when they wear suits and sit round a table.
>>
I did quiz VW UK about it. They said many VW owners have cover through premium bank accounts but then went on to say that Touareg and Phaeton have 3yrs cover, which of course is completely counter to their explanation.
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>> I did quiz VW UK about it. They said many VW owners have cover through
>> premium bank accounts but then went on to say that Touareg and Phaeton have 3yrs
>> cover, which of course is completely counter to their explanation.
Or maybe not. Once you get a free premium account (like HSBC Premier), although you don't have to pay for perks, the perks aren't as good. A bit frustrating!
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It's mad how much they never seem to look after existing customers.. And to think you have a gold membership. They really should determine your price a little more on your history of calling them- twice in 16 years?? £190 is way too steep.
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I was discussing my car insurance with SGAG yesterday. I needed to update my annual mileage from 8000 to 12000 - this cost me £19 which seems good value. However the man I was talking to mentioned that SAGA now own the AA (news to me!) and said I could get a preferential membership rate when I renew my car insurance.
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AA membership renewal - Meldrew
