Practically Classics Forum

Hi All
New to the forum but no doubt bringing up an old subject!
I am 53 years of age semi-retired and my 'daily driver' is an unmodified 1991 VW Golf GTI which I consider to be condition 1 and value accordingly, my insurance premium is up for renewal and I have been quoted £141 for myself and my wife (she has her own car) with protected NCB £200 excess. Not bad, so what's the problem you may say, well what I really want is agreed value but as my current insurer doesn't do it I have contacted a couple of 'specialist' classic car insurers.
Adrian Flux can do it for £150 but with a £400 excess and no protected NCB both of which are totally unacceptable to me, Hetitage-Quote £576 Heritage-JOKE more like.
Anybody out there who can point me in the direction of someone who can provide the type of cover I'm looking for on a modern classic or is it just that my car due to it's age is just not considered classic enough and really falls into the banger age group that all vehicles go through prior to becoming classics. I'm not looking for a quote that's cheaper than my current one just a sensibly priced one with reasonable excesses, protected no claims and agreed value with mileage restricted to 6k, not a lot to ask...is it??
Carl

Hi, Welcome to the forum.

Try RH insurance specialists, or Peter Best. I insure with both of them and am very happy with the service and cover I recieve.

Swinton insure my RR on an agreed value, maybe worth giving them a ring.

I have tried most of the insurance companies that state that they are 'classic car specialists' but by far the experts at this type of insurance are 'Haggerty' - they only cover classic cars and are very competitive - I have been with them for the last 3 years and in both service & price they have been untouchable

Usually agreed value classic policies don't use or accrue NCD, so protecting yours may be a problem. A lot also seem to require you to have another car as well.

Try Carole Nash. It's nice to speak to to folks who are enthusiatic and try to help. Plus one of the directors is a classic car owner and Fuzz is their 'Ambassador'.

Not that you are on commission or anything 'eh Phil

Thanks for your suggestions so far guys all very much appreciated.
My observations on your comments so far are that Peter Best, RH and Carole Nash have breakdown cover as standard which I already have and would be paying an additional premium for something I don't need. RH also require your car to be garaged for agreed value, I don't have a garage.
I do have another vehicle a 1992 VW camper but it is very much a second vehicle. As the GTI is my main driver if I took out flat rate insurance what would happen to my current NCB? I don't think you can put it on hold, if I went back to using a 'normal' car as my everyday, say in 2-3 years time, I'm sure that NCB would be lost and I would have to start from scratch. Although I have never had an insurance claim since 1982 I still have only 7 years NCB, I unknowingly 'lost' 3 years a couple of years ago when I changed insurers, ones max no claims was 9 years the one I changed to was 6, it was only when I changed again that I found this out, as far as I was concerned I had no claims back to '82 but no it's your current insurer that decides how much you have regardless of claims history, how many people realise that?
As I suggested initially I don't think simple agreed value insurance for daily driven modern classics exists so I find it quite annoying that articles on modern classics on both TV and in magazines extolling the virtues of driving a modern classic as your daily driver say that you can get cheaper classic car insurance because in my experience you can't, not until the car reaches a certain age and 22 years old doesn't appear to be that age, can you tell me different?

RE NCB, it can lay dormant for 2 years, but if you fail to use it before that 2 years you'll loose it.

No classic policies that I'm aware of carry a NCB, to maintain that you will have to have it on another car, posession of which is also usually a requirement of a "classic" policy. Given those two provisions, you should find that classic insurance is significantly cheaper than normal insurance, so I'm not quite sure what the problem is here....