I've been with greenflag for years but notice their terms have changed so they are pretty much no use to me any more. They'll only take the car to a garage within 10 miles of where you breakdown which if you have anything more unusual than a mondeo is hopeless. Plus you'd be stuck with your car at an unknown garage.
The cover I'd want would be: take car to specific specialist. Take me home or leave me at the specialist, no matter where in the UK I broke down including if it's a non starter on the door step! Most of the things that go wrong with the car aren't going to be fixable by a breakdown guy anyway.
What's the best way of doing this? I don't have pots of money to pay huge recovery costs as greenflag have just started charging by the mile for anything over the 10 miles. I've just renewed with them as I thought they were still doing the old cover which would take you and your car to a certain destination (would always be on the way to the specialist...) which was fine. They'd also have to cover a car that was 18.
I haven't actually used it that much. Once every other year I think max. Typically the blasted car has sprung a fuel leak so it isn't driveable and there isn't anywhere locally I could trust to fix it. And if there were I'd be stuck without a car anyway.
This year's renewal was 94 quid with personal cover ie any car I was in, home call and normal recovery, roadside assistance. Reading the exclusions it seems to have changed substantially from what it used to be.
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Did Greenflag's Recovery Plus not have this option?? i.e. taking car to garage of your choice
My breakdown renewal is due and I was thinking of going to Green Flag!
PS: As per Greenflag website, if you take Long Distance Recovery (which comes with Recovery Plus) they say "we take your car your home or preferred location."
Last edited by: movilogo on Tue 15 Jun 10 at 13:01
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It's very confusing. There is something called National recovery which might be it now. That would take you home or original destination and take the car to within 10 miles of your home, original destination or where you broke down. Found that on much closer inspection of the booklet. I get it via lloydstsb motoring and I think some things have different names as it has the lloyds logo all over it.
Not sure whether it applies to home call though as that would mean having to limp a fire hazard at least a quarter mile from home....
The booklet is confusing as it starts through the levels of cover and the services are all called all the same thing with changes on higher levels of cover in small print so it isn't easy to tell at a glance which one is which. It might be suitable after all...
I think I'd have to ring them up and ask what would happen under various breakdown scenarios!
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Watch out for that other great game, the "within a mile of home" or whatever distance they specify exclusion.
Because you actually might be somewhere that's three miles from home in actual road distance (down the bypass, off at the second exit, round the third corner)- but to the call centre, your location is only half a mile as the crow flies on a map, so you're out of luck.
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Greenflag's policy booklet has this line
We may choose to repair the vehicle (at your cost) following a breakdown, rather than arranging for it to be recovered.
which is bit confusing!
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I was a Britannia Rescue controller for a few years before I retired.
I still have honorary life cover and I've used it.
Brit will take you and the car where you decide.
If it's out of hours then they will take you home/hotel and give you another call-out in the morning to get it to a garage.
They have range of options to buy including De-Luxe cover which gives you a hire car or accomodation expenses.
Ted
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My cover isn't cheap and it applies to the car(s) not the person, my car in particular would cost an arm and a leg at the nearest MB dealer, so it's important that it comes home to my indy.
www.autohome.co.uk/
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GreenInsurance provides recovery to chosen destination at quite a cheap cost (price depends on how old is your vehicle).
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I might have a look at them too. My renewal isn't until next week so if they can't do what I need them to do in this session then I'll have to switch and cancel the cover for next year.
One of the reasons I've stuck with them as because it is an old car and some of the others exclude cars over a certain age.
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>> Watch out for that other great game, the "within a mile of home" or whatever
I have wondered about this, for example if you lived right next to the motorway and broke down on that motorway. Technically you might be too close to home, but common sense says you should be covered, its not like you'd have pushed your car there to get them to tow a non runner to the garage.
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Would www.autoaidbreakdown.co.uk/ give you the cover that you need?
It's a "pay and reclaim" system, but apparently it works well. Some reports say they're more focussed on recovery than roadside repair. Don't knwo if they would take a broken down car from home to a garage - I'll leave you to wade through the T's & C's!
I have it on daughter's car - she doesn't generally go far but I wanted a safety net in case something happens when I'm not around.
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Not sure I'd want the pay and reclaim kind as you could end up a gum tree if you paid out in good faith and they decided not to reimburse you.
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"Not sure I'd want the pay and reclaim kind as you could end up a gum tree if you paid out in good faith and they decided not to reimburse you".
Hasn't happened to me yet...and I've been with them since 1983 to my certain knowledge (could have been longer, but I remember claiming on a brand new A reg Golf Formel E that had a gear lever come adrift). Had five claims that I can remember - paid out straight away on them all. Just worked out that it amounts to one claim every 5.4 years. That includes pulling me out of a "rather deep" ford ( diesel engine hydraulic'ed) and bringing me about 25 miles home.
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Breakdown cover that offers the following - movilogo
