Hastings Direct Car Insurance Reviews - hastingsdirect.com

I would give them -1 if I could, Been with this company for 4 years , and had 16 years No Claims Discount, after scratching another car in a car park , they have reduced my NCD from 16 yrs to 4 . Spent 90 minutes on phone , most of that time on hold, and spoke to 5 different people, NONE of them could explain why this company do this, One of the agents actually asked "If I could prove I had 16 years NCD " I complained and my complaint has been upheld, But my NCD will not be restored, Imagine if you had 30 years NCD and you have an accident, even if its not your fault you will lose 26, YES 26 years NCD...yes maybe I should have protected it, but even that wont stop your renewal going sky high, next stop Ombudsman

I payed £150 for my kawasaki Z750 but ended up not liking it,so I brought a street triple 675r. I did an online quote and that came up at £233. So I thought I'd phone and and just swap my insurance over to my policy and probably pay the difference between £150 and the £233 but no they wanted £178 extra in total which took it to £328 bit of difference from £233. Problem is they got you either way if you cancel they take a chunk of your money as well. Been with this company for all my insurance probably for over 15 years or more. Will be looking else where next year.

I'm trying to cancel my policy with Hastings Direct the day before renewal is due to start - they have taken money out of my account 29 days after a renewal notice (I think it's supposed to be 30 days). There is no simple way to cancel your renewal via the web page - no excuse for this. You are advised to phone and then have to spend ages waiting for a customer representative. I've read several other reviews that say the same thing.

Unfortunately we havent had a great experience with Hastings.

We took out the insurance 5 days ago for my 18 year old daughter.

On Monday, she dropped back some library books to her college in Islington and picked up a couple of friends to go shopping in Westfield shopping centre white city. There was a lot of traffic and her friends were using her phone to add to playlists on spotify.

The next day, she opened the app and it was reporting 2 things:

- 1 excessive phone use whilst driving (although she personally never touched her phone once)

- 2 excessive cornering. This was being reported as she was driving down the exit ramp from the 6th floor on the car park. She had no choice but to come down in a spiral, there was no otherway to drive to but to do constant cornering.

We called Hastings as her driving score had dropped to 56% and we were obviously concerned and unfortunately spoke to someone.

I queried with him how the app works, was it using the internal gyroscope in the phone, he said it was. I said what if the phone drops out of the holder is that recorded as use? He said it would.

I asked what if my daughter pulled over and set a new sat nav journey and then drove off, how can it differentiate between this action and messing with the phone in traffic? He said it doesnt and it would be classed as using it whilst driving.

I asked if we could therefore just get a second phone to connect the blackbox to as she doesnt use the phone whilst driving and it would prevent these issues, he said that it was against the rules. I said that I had actually asked her on live chat about that and she said we coud. He said you cant. I said can you just show me where in the policy it says you cant, and he said that it couldnt off the top of his head, but its not allowed.

I said overall it was outrageous but that we would just get a second phone to connect to spotify so at least her friends can choose music and that interaction wouldnt be recorded. We came off the call.

within about 10 minutes we had a notification in the app stating that our insurance was cancelled. We immediately called him back and asked him what was going on. He said that have tried to maniupulate the data. I said we have done no such thing, we asked questions, I queried that we had been told otherwise and that it was not in the policy but at the end of the call we agreed to just get another phone for spotify. he said that would be allowed but its too late now as telematics have cancelled it based off what he had reported to him. He said that we told him multiple times that we would get another phone for the app.

I retirated to him that I had not said that but queried getting another phone, as we had been told we could. And that at the end of the call we said we'd just do it for spoitfy. he said well you told me otherwise mutliple times, and I said yes but at the end that was the compromise that we were going with.

I asked to speak to a manager, he said no one was available. I asked to speak to the telematics team, he said theyre not customer facing. I asked to raise a complaint which he said he had done and I have a raised a separate one on the website.

Overall however our insurance has been cancelled for not ACTUALLY doing anything wrong, just asking and being honest and open about what was and wasnt allowed under the policy. He for some reason took it upon himself to report only part of our conversation but not the end part, which was that we would just ensure that my daughters friends used a different phone for the music.

Overall I have found this service to be really poor. He needs training and to listen and help. His actions actually felt malicious.

I do not believe it is lawful or within any policies that you can cancel a policy based on his THINKING we might do something that we asked about being possible.

How can this be right? I bet there are loads of people just getting a second phone and attaching the app to that from the outset that you dont even know about. At least we were honest and asked the question!

So a Hastings policy holder writes my car off...

My vehicle is a personal lease where the registered owner is the finance company and the keeper is me

My finance company wanted £21k to settle and the market value of the Vehicle is £25k

I've made 19 payments of £334 plus a £3k deposit for the vehicle in question and Hastings have stated that because I'm not the keeper I am not owed the £4k difference meaning I have lost the £3k deposit paid plus the deposit I've had to pay on a new vehicle of the same value after the HASTINGS policy holder wrote mine off!!

What kind of insurance company is this? Terrible one it seems

Do the right thing Hastings or I'll see you in court!

After taking out a car insurance policy and providing the anticipated mileage for the year, I was contacted by them and accused of lying about my annual mileage expectations. They had looked back over other car insurance quotes I had run in the past and because I had run a number of quotes to find the best deal they accused me of lying. When I explained I was sure of my maximum anticipated mileage and was happy to not be covered if I exceeded it they still wouldn't let it drop. Then I was accused of lying about when I bought the car. I estimated it to be in February 3 years ago but they claim to have run a credit check and know I bought it on 22nd Jan. First of all, I bought it for cash so there is no way a credit checked showed anything. And why does being 9 days out on the purchase date from 3 years ago affect this years insurance policy! After 10 minutes of being talked to like a criminal I asked to cancel the policy with immediate effect as I was so annoyed at the way I was being treated. They have now cancelled the policy are claiming on the cancellation notice that it is because I failed to provide them with details of my annual mileage. This is an outright lie! The policy was cancelled at my request. I have been charged absurd cancellations fees and feel that they never wanted my business in the first place and were looking to find a reason to cancel the policy just so they could keep the fees without providing cover, it felt like the kind of thing a sham company would do to take your cash without providing the service.

Id advise anyone to not insure with Hastings direct they are shammers, customer service is really bad, and everyone you speak to is quick to pass the buck and nothing gets resolved.they will take your money quick time but if you have an issue then it's your fault and will cancel your insurance.i would never recommend these guys to anyone. My advice stay well clear of Hastings direct

Please avoid!!!!Run as fast as you can!

I had a policy with them for more than 7 months. Last week they decided that they meed more information regarding my details.

I sent the requested details and they decided to cancel my policy because the car purchase date from their records is different -1 year from the date from V5. They said that they can't update this in their records and they will cancel my policy in 7 days.They will charge me also a cancellation fee of £45 , but my policy will not appear as cancelled in the insurance companies database. Abusive attitude, abusive cancellation, please avoid

Totally disgusted with there service refused to renew my car ins .just informed me that it was based on certain factors I've poss theft in my area .make of car etc .of which none of these apply to me .and then went on to say they can't see any specific reason in my case but wont renew it .in my opinion the only thing that has changed is my age .is that the reason but are hiding behind excuses so as not to be seen as ageist.avoid this company or risk being dumped for no reason

Cancelation fee was suddenly £80 and not £45

I rejected car I bought from big world motoring due to major faults and had to cancel insurance in 20 days.