Finding That Elusive Affordable Car Insurance

In most countries the law requires some form of car insurance. It's also a fact that car insurance may be a very significant expense as part of a personal or household budget. As a result, many individuals and families spend considerable amounts of time searching for affordable car insurance.

There are many different ways of conducting a search for the best deal. The traditional method was to phone around several insurance companies to get prices and information. Although this worked, it was time consuming and tedious as it involved repeating the same personal details over and over again.

Then the telephone broker services arrived and that helped because usually only one or two calls were required before a recommended best price was offered. The difficulty there was that it could be difficult or impossible to see which car insurance companies had been 'checked' by the broker concerned.

The arrival of the Internet has now made searching for affordable car insurance much easier. It's now possible to utilise a number of different and more 'visible' methods to search, compare and see exactly what's on offer. Hopefully, this will subsequently find you the best deals.

By using a car insurance comparison website you can quickly search and compare car insurance policies from a wide range of providers. This type of service not only allows you to compare motor cover by price but some services allow you to compare by some of the key policy features too (such as an inclusive courtesy car).

Although the search for affordable car insurance is now easier than ever, the story doesn't entirely stop there. There are inevitably numerous ways in which a potential policy buyer may be able to make their car insurance that little bit cheaper. This may involve traditional things such as restricting the policy cover to drivers over a certain age or taking a slightly higher excess (the amount of any damage claim the policy holder would have to pay) on the policy.

It's also worth thinking about the type of cover required. That's because some insurance companies will offer car insurance that can break down into three components: third party, third party fire and theft and fully comprehensive.

Third party insurance cover is the legal minimum in most countries and covers the driver against payments to any third parties injured by them in an accident. In this case, no cover is available for the vehicle driven and many insurance companies may be reluctant to offer this type of cover alone.

Third party fire and theft insurance operates in the same way but the vehicle driven is covered for risks arising from fire and theft only -not for other damage.

Fully comprehensive provides the above two categories of insurance plus cover for damage to the vehicle itself. This insurance will usually be the most expensive type of cover to take if all other things are equal. Selecting a lower cover type of policy will typically reduce the costs, but it may be advisable to consider carefully the risks involved.

Finding affordable car insurance is no longer the hassle that it used to be. The internet has made searching for and comparing car insurance quotes a quick and easy proposition for anyone looking for a good deal on their insurance premiums.

Jon McGovern is from Tescocompare.com, the insurance comparison site where you can compare car insurance policy features and prices.