Age UK Home Insurance

I received a letter from Age UK (ageco) inviting me (as a 'mature' person) to get a home insurance quote. I filled in the relevant information online, trying to achieve as near as possible, the level of cover my current and other provider's quotes gave me. Imagine my shock (nearly fell off my chair!)

when my quote came up as £957.80!! over four times any other provider's quotes, for pretty much the same cover. The interest rate for paying monthly with them was high also. can't imagine why anyone would dream of paying these way over inflated prices when there is a huge choice of other companies out there offering insurance at a fraction of this price.

Also, I could only obtain a quote by giving very detailed information, giving my e-mail address was not enough, I couldn't get a quote without giving my telephone number. Most other providers are happy with an e-mail address.

The renewal document does not show the previous years premium! All other policies I have now state clearly what I paid the previous year.

When I pointed this out was told customers should just dig out last years paperwork and check!

The telephone representative gave me the wrong figure for last premium amount she quoted £34 more then I actually paid making it seem that this new policy was £26 cheaper (If I hadn’t queried that that seemed unusual she would not have rechecked to give give me correct figure) than last year not £8 more expensive!! This is on a relatively small premium increase of almost 13% having not claimed!

Very poor service .

I review prices every year, including using CashBack sites.

TipCashback are offering £84 for Age UK policies, so I thought, that's good, but.

Age UK's quote is three to four time the rest, >£600 compared to average of £200.

You'd be mad to use Age UK.

I was suckered by a positive 'Which' review into trying AgeUK. Went right through the - onerous - house etc. details.

Then, right at the end, was told: "We cannot quote on the information provided. Please contact us"

So I did. And waited 25 minutes of muzak for someone to pick up. Who then told me that, since the house was within 200 metres of a river, they couldn't quote. And that they wouldn't quote for ANY house in my postcode. Which I had put in at the beginning of the process.

It matters nought that my house is up a hill, and hasn't flooded in 200 years,

So: an hour of my time wasted, for nothing. And which could easily have been avoided, with a few extra lines of code in their online form.

A V O I D ! ! !

Have had Age Concern contents for several years and never made a claim. Yesterday came home and found our AEG fridge freezer, which is only 8 months old had developed a fault and the icecream etc had melted. I had stocked up for the summer holidays. Currys can't send an engineer until Wednesday so the food will need to be binned though I am cooking and eating up as much as possible so I estimate the total loss will be under £100. There is an exces of £45 on the policy but I was disapponted to be advised by Age Concern that it really wasn't worth claiming as it would result in an increased premium next year. I have been paying for insurance for decades , initially with other companies , then with Age Concern since retirement with not a single claim and now find this policy penalises instead of protecting us.

Ages UK have been wonderful in the overall service they have given me and my Mother however there homecare service is awful.

I have requested home services numerous times and have been informed by age uk bucks and that someone will call me in a few days and they have not.

When I enquire age uk bucks do not seem interested.

I have requested for the handyperson when I was going through the stressful time of moving my Mother into her retirement flat and was told that someone will call me and no one did even when I chased ages uk.

I have also asked them for homecare service for my Mother to cut her hair and her nails and again no one has called yet.

Being a carer is stressful enough without this lack of care service age uk bucks.

Age UK says: We understand how important it is to have buildings and contents insurance you can rely on. Age UK Home Insurance is designed for the over 50s and has no hidden admin fees and no nasty surprises.

Be under no illusion. If you have a claim then absolutely no part of the claims process is different from any other policy.

Put another way, in a home emergency which gives rise to a claim the elderly, especially the very elderly and disabled, who will have special and unique needs, will be unable to cope easily with the disruption of their life while restoration and restitution takes place. The Age UK insurer has just one standard claims process for all their policies, no matter how old or infirm the claimant.

'Making special allowance for an old person would be discriminatory against other claimants' they said.

For a company who is meant to be for older people I think they are out to mislead them. Having been with Age Uk for 3years I unfortunately had to make a claim. With water coming through my ceiling they informed me that plumbing problems were not covered in accidental damage buildings or contents insurance. This was not clearly written in the policy documents. A terrible dishonest imoral company, posing to be something they aren't abs are preying on a vulnerable group. Do not buy insurance with AgeUK!

Took out cover for home, contents and legal cover, which covers you for legal expenses. Had an issue came to light with my solicitor who overcharged me, and I was advised to take legal action, it only came to light this year months after cover started but it was rejected as I started using the solicitor before the cover started.

The solicitor dealt with buying the property I covered, so I could not take out cover before I had bought the property!!

Was sent around in circles by Age UK, (who use Ageas) who then use DAS so you end up dealing with 3 companies not one.

No e mail address to use for them, very disappointed with Age UK I had expected a lot better from them. Taken out insurance now with another company, better cover and hundreds of pounds cheaper.

One other point, Age UK give a discount to a new customer, but not if you are an existing one, clearly they are not interested in keeping customers, only getting new ones each year. Shame on you Age UK.

Quality of cover high yet premium reasonable and interest free monthly payments.Only downside found website very clunky as certain boxes would not disappear. Found this one of the worst customer interfaces to use and I am very experienced at using websites.