OT: Insurance company trying to fleece me?!

[tim.....]

ISTM that horse has already bolted and he now needs to shut the stable door as carefully as possible

tim

[Tim Watts]

It's a red herring.

I *considered* buying a Tesla S for £100k. In my dreams. I even ran it through comparethemarket out of morbid interest. There is nothing they can deduce from that other than I was window shopping...

I'd love one - but no, it's not happening!

[Tim+]

The big problem is how do you prove that your car isn't chipped?

Say you've gone for one of these units.

You'd be a fool to submit the car for inspection when the unit is so easy to remove. Consequently, I can see why with such an easily reversible mod, insurance companies may act just on suspicion of modification.

I suspect that the OP's best bet it to cancel the existing policy and take out insurance with a company that's not part of the same group and who doesn't load the premium.

He really should ask in UK.legal.moderated though (as well as going to a CAB) rather than asking here as it's not guesses and opinions that he needs but solid legal advice.

Tim

[damduck-egg]

Maybe they were mixing it up with the Christian Fish symbol often seen displayed on the back of a car, for some reason like a wearing a Trilby hat it seems to disable the brain of drivers of such vehicles. Premiums should be higher for such people as they are a menace.

G.Harman

[gremlin_95]

First of all, thank you to everyone for your responses.

I called them today and I am pleased to say it was a relatively pain free process.

I confirmed that no modifications had been carried out and told them I had only obtained a quote with modifications included out of curiosity. They were apologetic and have stopped any money being taken from my (debit) card. I also asked for confirmation of this by email & post - email has been received.

[Tim+]

Phew! Good result. As you may have seen in my most recent post, I can see why insurance companies might just act on suspicion in the case of chipping as some chip modifications are user removable rendering a vehicle inspection pointless.

Tim

[gremlin_95]

Yep I can see why. If anyone is interested, I found out from a colleague who does have a car which is remapped that Admiral will not cover your car if it is remapped but they will cover it if is chipped. I am not entirely sure why this is. I guess they only way they could check if a vehicle was remapped is by doing some sort of rolling road test.

[Adrian]

Because Admiral are a bunch of wuckfits?

Would somebody be so kind as to explain the difference to me?

[Tim Watts]

I suspect you are a latent psycho - can I kill you in self defence?

[charles]

when organisinga motor rally some 40 years ago, one entrant declared "Bodywork modified by Stone Walls of Cornwall"

[Bob Eager]

I have one of these on my car...

[Tim+]

I was expecting that to be one of these (Flying Spaghetti Monster).

Tim

[Tim Watts]

There are a lot of humourous "Xtian fish" variants:

But I like:

._SS500_.jpg

and this (whilst not a bumper sticker) is hilarious:

[Chris Bartram]

Nothing these days, but back in the day people actually did pull the EPROMS, I suppose. Same result, though, so I think your first answer applies....

[Chris Bartram]

Firmware checksum? Boost values from OBD?

I suspect the real answer is the insurance co will accept his word- after all, we could all be driving around with undeclared mods. If he has a claim, they'll be all over it like a rash *then*.

[Bob Eager]

I had a particular reason for wanting the Darwin one. As some readers will know...

[John Rumm]

Its all a bit meaningless anyway given that many cars do a certain amount of automatic remapping to adjust to variables like fuel quality and driving style anyway. (I appreciate you can push this much further with manual intervention, but it does away with the idea of a "standard" mapping)

[Andy Burns]

I have this one ...

[The Other Mike]

Back then some of us even got the correctly printed tamperproof thin foil factory seals produced by a sweatshop in the far east :)

[polygonum]

Quite understandable - but a total nightmare if you bought your vehicle second-hand. Then it would be your responsibility find out and declare as appropriate - but how many people would know they needed to, let alone how to do so?

Perhaps dealers should have to provide a certificate of some sort - so that at least the poor sap buying it has a clear defence.