"Protection is a waste of time, since whilst you maintain your number of years' NCD, the initial premium rises because of your increased risk. Total con!"

Not from our experience. We have guaranteed no claims discount protection on both policies (costs about £ 5 per year). In 2008, partner's car was hit by an uninsured drug dealers car being chased by the police. Damage to our car was approx £1900. Went down as an uninsured loss. No increase in premium at renewal and subsequent renewals due to claim. Paid £ 284 February 2011 (fully comp, business use, Birmingham postcode), £ 50 accidental damage excess).

There is absolutely no way you should loose that much NCB. We are with Aviva and the max you can earn is 5 years anyway which is 65%. First claim you loose 2 years down to 40%, next claim within however many years reduces it to zero.

Using Aviva as an example if you were on the max. 65% and your full premium was £200 per month, after your 65% NCB was deducted you would be paying £70 per month. After an accident your NCB would reduce to 40% at your next renewal and your monthly payment would be £120 per month, an increase of £50 a month but not double.

We have protected NCB, costs little extra, £15 a year, and even though after an accident we would possibly get loaded it would not be as much as loosing your NCB.

Personally I dislike with a passion these pay monthly direct debit schemes whether they be insurance or gas and electricity companies. They are always to keen to double you payment at a moments notice but you try getting anything back and its a fight.

Best of luck and check your policy docuemnt, there is something seriously wrong here.

Edited by thunderbird on 22/01/2012 at 18:23

With 9 years NCB and no protection after one fault incident you usually go to 3 years NCB.

That seems harsh. I think DL work on a maxiumum of 5 years NCD on a 30, 40, 50, 60, 70% basis (although they will record more than 5 years no claims on the insurance certificate). A claim only reduces the NCD by 2 years.

It seems you are agreeing with me.

As you state they work to a maximum of 5 years NCB, regardless of how many years you actually have in excess of this. If you lose 2 years you are back to just 3 years.

LV are the same - they give you 70% discount up to 5 years then for the next 5 years give a further 1% per year, so after 10 years you have a 75% discount. If you have a claim you are regarded as having five years NCB (even if you have 10,20, 30 years without a claim) and lose 2 years so start again at 3 years.

Edited by daveyjp on 23/01/2012 at 09:54