Fall in Quoted Car Insurance Premiums could be Slowing Down

• Average quoted premiums drop by 10.8% in the past 12 months but rose slightly month-on-month in April
• In April, motorists most commonly received a quote between £250 and £499, Consumer Intelligence data shows.

Falls in quoted car insurance premiums could be slowing down despite dropping 10.8% in the past year, according to the latest Consumer Intelligence Car Insurance Price Index¹.

It shows quoted premiums rose slightly month on month in April but still fell by 1.3% in the past three months.

Drivers in Wales saw the biggest fall in the past year at 21.1% and six other regions – the South East, North East, South West, Eastern, West Midlands, Yorkshire & The Humber – recorded double digit drops.

But London saw quoted premiums rise 2% in the past three months and drop by just 0.2% over the past 12 months.

There was good news for younger drivers – 30% of under-25s could source a quote for under £750 in April which was more than double the 13% who could do so last April.

Drivers most commonly received a quote between £250 and £499 with 26% of quotes falling in this range and 23% between £500 and £749.

“There was more stability in the motor market between February and April. Competitive premiums fell at a slower rate, even rising slightly month-on-month in April ,” says Max Thompson, Insurance Insight Manager at Consumer Intelligence.

“Competition remains strong. Half of the most competitive quotes in April came from five underwriters. With big deals including Aviva buying Direct Line and Ageas buying esure in progress, it will be interesting to see how this evolves,” adds Thompson.

Long-term view

Average quoted premiums have risen by 101.1% – slightly more than doubled – since October 2013 when Consumer Intelligence began collecting data.

The over-50s have seen the largest increase, with premiums rising by 127.4%, while the under-25s have experienced the smallest rise at 31.8%. Drivers aged between 25 and 49 have seen average quoted premiums increase by 121.9%.

Age differences in the past year

The over-50s benefited the most from price falls with average quoted premiums down 16% in the past year while those aged 25 to 49 saw prices drop 9.7% and the under-25s experienced falls of 3.4%.

Quoted premiums have fallen 0.9% for the under-25s in the past three months and by 1% and 2% respectively for those aged 25 to 49 and the over-50s.

Telematics

The proportion of the rank one to five quotes that are from telematics providers remained at 17% which was the same level as January.

There were marginal changes for the under-50s with the proportion of top five quotes coming from telematics providers rising 1% to 39% for the under-25s and by 1% to 16% for those aged 25 to 49. The proportion of top five quotes for over-50s was unchanged at 9%.

Regional differences

All regions saw falls in average quoted premiums over the past year but the range of decreases was as high as 21.1% in Wales and as low as just 0.2% in London.

London was the only region to record an increase in quoted premiums in the past three months at 2% but three other regions – Scotland, East Midlands and West Midlands – recorded marginal falls of 0.6% while the North East saw a 0.8% decline.

^1. For each risk, common to consecutive months, the variation is calculated from the average of the five cheapest premiums returned on each PCW in the previous month to the average of the Top Five in the current month regardless of which brands provided these quotes. The exercise is repeated on each PCW for each common risk. The Overall Market Top Five monthly variation is calculated by averaging across all these risk level Top Five variations for common risks run in both months. The monthly figures are concatenated up to produce the trended price index from a starting point of 100% in the base month