The Quagmire of Payment Protection Insurance
Perhaps unwisely for a someone who can earn commission on Payment Protection Insurance (PPI), I’ve mentioned a few times how you can save money by going to a specialist insurer rather than accepting the payment protection offered by the secured loan, loan or mortgage provider.
Well, this morning I thought - as I’ve mentioned this a few times, then perhaps I should back it up by mentioning some of the specialist companies who offer stand alone insurance.
I’m not an expert in Insurance (some may argue I’m not an expert in anything!) So I had to do a bit of early morning Internet digging. As with more or less everything in the finance world, it ended up being a bit of an eye opener.
First of all I thought I’d build up a list of the providers, then visit their websites, read their policies, look at their prices and then present a concise list on here - job done - I could then go away and enjoy the remainder of the Bank Holiday - but oh no - life’s not like that.
To start to build up my list I visited Moneysavingexpert.com, The Motley Fool and thisismoney. I purposefully missed out the price comparison sites Moneysupermarket and Uswitch - my argument being that Insurers would only appear if they had a commission deal with the site.
Moneysavingexpert said “A growing number of firms, such as Best Insurance, Paymentcare and British Insurance offer cheap policies”
The Motleyfool said “Get it from a cheaper ’stand-alone’ provider, such as: paymentcare, Helpupay, Best Insurance, British Insurance, Burgesses, mortgageprotect and the Post Office”.
Thisismoney just repeated the same companies, but I still thought - this is great I’ve only visited 3 sites and I’ve already got 7 providers. But then I did some investigation and found that Mortgageprotect and Helpupay are one and the same company - they are both trading names of Pinnacle Insurance PLC. I then discovered that Best Insurance, British Insurance and Burgesses are trading names of British Insurance Ltd. So Martin Lewis’s (the moneysavingexpert) ‘growing number of firms’ was actually an unimpressive list of two (but I note he has a commission scheme with both!) and The Motley Fool’s slightly more impressive list of seven was actually four.
I then did a little bit more digging and found that British Insurance Ltd. trade under the names - WAIT FOR IT - Burgesses-insurance, Burgesses, 123-mortgage-protection, Protectiononline, Instant-payment-protection, Shelter, Bestinsurance, Protectyourloan, Uvinsurance, - DEEP BREATH - Rhinoinsurance, Protectyourmortgage, Protectyourearnings, Biba-mortgage-protection , Safetyfirst, Insureyourmoney , Goodinsurance and Stokeinsurance and this isn’t even a comprehensive list, believe me there are more!
I then scratched my head - scratched it some more and came to the conclusion that if you’re looking for payment protection insurance then the following seem to be the best companies to go to:-
http://www.payprotect.co.uk/
http://www.pinnacle.co.uk/
http://www.paymentcare.co.uk/
http://www.britishinsurance.com
http://www.postoffice.co.uk
Please bear in mind that some form of payment protection schemes pay the money directly to you - if you find yourself in the unfortunate position of being unemployed this may effect your benefits as it is might be seen as income by the Jobcentre. Please also note that if you apply for the Post Office cover, the Post Office is only acting as an ‘Introducer’ for Axa and as always - if you’re taking out any financial commitment, it’s sometimes wise to seek professional advice.
