M&S insurance did I do the right thing

Due to the policy changing on M&S home and contents I have to declare any bikes over £2k (4 bikes including 1 over £5k). I’ve just spoken to them and its put my policy up from £438 to £699.
Do I have any better options?

I did the same.

Yes. I moved to the AA and slashed the joke of a price from M&S in half if I remember right.

Have you tried increasing the excess to offset some of the price rise?

Did the policy wording change then? I seem to recall it was kept for existing policies, but maybe they’ve er updated that. FWIW we were getting a large increase from M&S (bikes were still covered but they were messing us about something rotten) and so upped to NFU. Very reasonable.

Just recently gone with M&S from The AA, but also added on buildings too. I found that the policies offered by both were underwritten by AXA and a similar price. Went to M&S purely because the people on the end of the phone seemed to be a bit more, er, intelligent.

I had to declare bikes over £1k, still this was cheaper than independent insurance, e.g. cycleguard

EDIT: Also M&S were 0% APR too 🙂

The AA isn’t new for old, so not the same level of cover.

Made £63 a year difference to me but I’ve only 1 bike over 2K.

I did a ‘Go Compare’ & ended up sticking with them & declaring the bike, most other companies either wouldn’t insure or were mad prices.

Had a claim with M&S a couple of years ago for some ridge tiles that came off the house, it was like, ‘how much have you been quoted for the repairs Mr G?’, ‘£680 inc vat, do you want any more quotes?’, ‘No, the money will be in you A/C within 4 working days’,
& it was. Good service.

what if your bike gets nicked away from the house is it covered ? I was thinking about getting some bike insurance not sure whether to add to home insurance or get bike insurance.

Hang on, if you are insuring multiple expensive bikes for that price you are doing rather well, ime.

Anyway I thought M&S had given up on bikes?

Go with LV. I really struggled finding insurance that would cover the tandem (much more than £2k!) but they were very reasonable, around £300 pa if I remember correctly.

what if your bike gets nicked away from the house is it covered

Varies by provider. Yes with M&S.

Went with Allianz/Yourcoverinsurance – bikes have to be declared but tailoring the policy gave us cheaper cover than M&S

I did the same as you. Still worked out better overall with M&S from what I could see. Again, bike specific insurance would have hammered me a lot more, and I get the impression they’re pretty good when you have to claim.

Same here but worked out slightly cheaper with nfu.

I’ve just spoken to them and its put my policy up from £438 to £699.

The only way you can know if it’s competitive is to get more quotes, asking us is a bit pointless IMO, as for a starter you are already paying over twice what we pay already.

Just had this, M&S would have gone up from £400 to £600 due to the change in bike cover. Just had a quote with John Lewis, their Premier cover covers bikes up to £1000 automatically, so covers 2 of mine, and added the 3rd(valued at £3500), and the premium is around £360 a year. Bit more expensive than some, but seems to have better cover.

My renewal is due in a couple of months so watching these threads with interest…

In the end check all the small print!
Is it the same cover?
New for old? Away from home, Accidental Damage etc.

Our Australian one have several levels of excess for things like racing & carbon frames which are worth noting but not an issue.

Those recommending the AA (and other similar providers) – that will be no use to the OP as it has a total limit of £10k, and I’m fairly sure that with 4 bikes over £2k one if which is worth £5k he’ll be over that. Other providers may be good for those with just a few bikes, but for those of us with a whole fleet then M&S still appears to be the best value – others look attractive until you find you have to specify every single bike you own, or at least all those over £1k, or that there is a total fleet limit including all bikes (with numerous cycles worth more than £500 but less than £2k which I don’t have to specify with M&S it soon adds up). I got lots of quotes when I was renewing, but in the end went back to M&S – the trick is to increase the excess a bit (ours was very low originally) which makes a significant difference to the premium.

The maximum value of unspecified bikes has been reduced from £4000 to £2000 on existing M&S policies and is only £1000 on new policies.

Be careful with LV (and others), they have a 2.5k limit on outbuildings (which includes garages, even if attached). You’d need to keep your bikes in the house to be covered.

Only £5k for NFU in outbuildings too.

I swapped from M&S and went with Direct Line, had to declare bikes ( and pay a small supplement for) over £1000 but premium still came in at a third of the M&S renewal with very similar levels of cover, excess etc.
I’ve had dealings with Direct Line before on motor insurance and they were very efficient and offered good service, although I’m hoping I never find out how good they are on home insurance!

I’m moving house so also starting again on insurance after a few years with M&S. Probably going with NFU but I understand from them that they also don’t replace new for old. So beware that. Have others not experienced the same?

Do Direct line cover bikes over 2k these days? Last time I got them to quote, they simply couldn’t comprehend that a single bike was over 2k and so couldn’t quote.

I ended up with American Express, seem to provide very good cover for the money.

Also switched to Amex last month, again under written by Axa. All bikes specified (~ £9k total)and electricals (iPhone etc.) for about half what M&S wanted.

Just gave M&S a call and changed my excess from £150 to £250, the premium dropped from £699 to £657. I tried an excess of £350 but the saving wasn’t much more so I didn’t bother.

Thanks for the suggestion granny_ring 🙂

Our renewal came not long ago for Mns and due to policy changes neither of our bikes were covered so I’ve cancelled it for now so I’m not tied into the contract and will start ringing around. Will try those that have been recommended on here.

anyone do stolen from the house cover cheaply? I’m pretty careful with my bikes (after getting a few knicked as a kid) not too worried about them getting stolen while out and about, think the cost of covering them all everywhere wouldn’t be worth it and of course only one could get pinched at once, but all of them getting pinched from home (inside the house) during a break in would be pretty expensive to replace.

any ideas?

I ended up with Axa via Amex btw.

anyone do stolen from the house cover cheaply? … all of them getting pinched from home (inside the house) during a break in would be pretty expensive to replace.

Exactly the way I’ve been thinking (my M&S policy runs out in October). Be interested in anything you might find out. Think I have some time playing online quotations coming up 🙁

Surprised that the increase in excess didn’t reduce it by more than that OP. Having said that I cant remember if I did that this year or not, if not I will next year!

anyone do stolen from the house cover cheaply? … all of them getting pinched from home (inside the house) during a break in would be pretty expensive to replace.

Exactly the way I’ve been thinking (my M&S policy runs out in October). Be interested in anything you might find out. Think I have some time playing online quotations coming up

Thread resurrection just to add to the forum knowledge on M&S renewals!

After lots of hunting around and running into issues with most other companies I’ve ended up renewing with M&S

Nearly went with Hiscox who will cover bikes for their full value at home under normal policy terms, I would have had to pay a bit more than a standard quote because my garage having no door from the house was considered an outbuilding. Adding away from home cover was quite a bit more (from £340 -> £650).

Was pretty close to taking the Hiscox option for good cover at home as per the quote above, but naming bikes and pushing up the excess with M&S came out with a renewal at £423 which seems worth it for the away from home cover.

I also carried on with M+S. Why – everytime I ring up, and I have several times, I have had a quick answer and very professional dealings with them. This IMO is worth he little extra it might be.

Just renewed with m amd s. One bike specified at three k, plus engagement ring at 4k, and pp out the home of 2k.. did a compare and could get similar for less money but not with the same limits so upped the xs as prev noted knocking £60 off bringing closer to the compared quotes..

Can highly recommend cooperative insurance, single item upto 3k insured. I’ve just had to make a claim for three expensive bikes and they paid out without quibble.

I could replace all my bikes once every five years for th same amouint you lot are spending on insurance, of course the I’d have new bikes and they’d cost more to insure.

Am pleased for you Oliver.