Been with the RAC about 12yrs and never used them. Renewal just arrived but a bit thrown as this year we have two cars under the Citroen warranty with breakdown/recovery included. However in common with many makers agreements it only includes breakdowns related to items that would be covered under warranty.... so not a fuel/tyre/keys/similar problem.
Add to that the usual annoyance from the RAC. They say the cost for my membership (joint any car recovery/breakdown) is £138-50, my personal discount £14 so £124-50 payable.
But go on their website and £124-50 is their standard cost for anyone with an online discount of £28-25 leaving £96-25 payable.
I wonder if there is a better scheme given I really only need to top up the Citroen cover to an all situations agreement.... perhaps one of the claim if you use types?
If I have to go for full cover AA seems the cheapest at £88-65 for the same cover as my RAC.
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Do they not do a "top up" scheme themselves (Citroen-RAC)? The GFs Fiat Bravo came with full AA cover (all bells and whistles one, including relay and European) for one year. At the end of the first year she had the option (which she took) to extend the FULL AA cover for a further 2 years at a heavily discounted £60 for the two years, which I thought was excellent.
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I had the same problem with the AA, and found the same level of cover for £86 ( their top package) at Gem Motor Assist.
Pat
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As mentioned before, I use Autoaid, think its about £36 quid or so and that covers me and missus in both our cars. Ok you need to pay for any call out you have and then reclaim, I have never had to do this so far but from previous recommendations, this seems to be a very smooth process.
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Hmm. I have a newish Audi with 3 years' Audi Assist, and thought this was all-bells-and-whistles. Better check. On the other car, we use Brittania Rescue which covers the car (any driver) for breakdown plus relay for a reasonable £39.50, though I think that's the CSMA members' rate. Only used them once, when the EGR valve went on the Mondy TDCi whilst towing. They turned up very quickly, but then we had a loooong wait for a breakdown truck that could handle taking both the Mondy and the caravan back home.
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>> Hmm. I have a newish Audi with 3 years' Audi Assist and thought this was
>> all-bells-and-whistles. Better check.
Some of them are very limited - Mercedes Mobilo is too, once over a certain age, and covers mechanical and electrical breakdown only.
But we have cover on a Honda and on a Mitsubishi and both get renewed after 3 years if the car is dealer serviced (but you seem to have to ask, it's not willingly offered) and they're both all singing all dancing, and full Euro cover too, which, although not necessary for us, would be a really worthwhile benefit if you needed it.
>> On the other car we use Brittania Rescue which covers the car
>> (any driver) for breakdown plus relay for a reasonable £39.50 though I think that's the
>> CSMA members' rate.
I think you've remembered that price wrongly! We used to have that (through CSMA) on one of our cars and it was £70 for the same level of cover.
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>> I think you've remembered that price wrongly!
Sorry - I just checked the CSMA website and they've really bombed the prices, it used to be not much cheaper for non-CSMA members but now there's a huge difference. Which is odd as CSMA no longer owns Brittania!
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Just a conclusion. Remembering RAC wanted £124.50 from us for roadside/recovery, a new RAC customer would only pay £96.25 and the AA would have given me the same cover for £88 (first year only of course).
Had the conversation with the RAC helpline this morning with an unexpected result. Guy says in our circumstances we can have our existing cover level at a 50% discount for £62.25... and that discount will remain each year if we don't use the service.
Excellent.
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Fenlander - you got a result there. Must be the recession!
I had a similar problem with the RAC a few months back. They wanted to charge me a much higher premium than a new joiner, despite the fact that I've only called them out twice for minor things in 20 years of membership.
I spoke to them all nicey-nicey, but they wouldn't budge one penny on price, so I joined Green Flag instead.
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Actually I was amazed at the amount they moved... I'd expected an offer a few pounds above the AA to stop me going to the trouble of swapping.
We'll see at next years renewal if the 50% discound really does roll on.
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If you go via Quidco.com you can get some cashback on RAC cover.
I got £15 on £70 cover.
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