We finally took your picture down off the wall, ah Jesse how do you always seem to know just when to...
We finally took your picture down off the wall, ah Jesse how do you always seem to know just when to call
Member since:18.10.2005
Reviews:48
Members who trust:18
Before writing this review I read through some of the others as wanted to get an idea of what other people thought and there does, as another reviewer pointed out, seem to be a trend of everyone who hasn't had to make a claim thinks they are great...
Unfortunatley I happened to be one of the poor souls who had to make a claim, and even though this was a non-fault claim this didn't make it any easier!
Diamond - The company
Diamond is owned by Admiral Insurance which own a host of other insurance companies including Elephant. I was always amazed how I could get radically different quotes from different companies all owned by the same company, however I suppose I never delved into the small print of each so there may well be a valid reason for this but anyway I'm wondering off the point here! The company operates on the premise not, as commonly thought, that woman are better drivers, but that their claims in general cost less. On this basis by insuring woman only Diamond can offer women lower insurance premiums. They do allow males to be insured but only as named drivers
The policy
Having seen various television advertisements, speaking to a friend insured by them and receiving an outrageous renewal quote from my existing insurer (Admiral?!) I decided to check them out. I must admit my experiences from getting the quote through to being insured were perfectly fine. Diamond is very honest about what is and is not included in the policy, optional extras that you can choose not to pay for and save money
and the quote was very reasonable in relation to others I had received. I had my flatmate insured on my car as well, had hire car cover as well which is often lacking in cheaper insurance quotes.
The Claim:
So everything was going swimmingly until one fateful day in June this year. My flatmate had borrowed my car and then I received a phone call... someone had driven into the back of the car and she wanted me to come down because the guy was being really cagey about giving his details. So I got my dad to pick me up and off we went where the guy had no bother giving his details to my dad!
Anyway there wasn't too much damage to the car but seeing as the guy had admitted it was his fault and I wanted to sell the car I wanted it repaired. So I did as instructed on my policy documents and called Diamond straightaway to inform them of the accident. They told me they would send through something to the garage and someone would be in contact with me. Two days later I received a call from an accident management company who informed me they would be helping me at no charge to myself and arranged for me to bring the car to the garage so they could assess the damage. I did so despite the fact that their nearest recommended garage was about 20 miles away (I had to use their garage in order to get a hire car which I have no complaints about as this was made clear at the time I purchased the policy)...
You may at this stage be wondering what my complaint is as everything seems to be pretty standard at the moment well read on....
The garage started getting very funny about everything, the accident management company had said they would drop off the hire car and at the same time pick up my car and take it to the garage. This seemed a very sensible idea to me. Obviously not to the garage as they refused and wanted to pick up the car themselves at some point between 8 and 2! Luckily my mum was off work that day so I arranged for her to be at my house in order for them to pick the car up. They picked it up and the hire car was delivered. The accident management company were constantly in touch with the garage who gave an estimate of about two weeks. I then received a phonecall from the garage one Tuesday (only a week later) to say the car would be delivered the next day so someone needed to be there to collect the car and pay the excess of £400 (I was prepared to pay this as I knew I would be getting it back) I then offered to pay the excess by credit card then and there. I was then informed they would only accept cash. This had not been mentioned at any point and suddenly just before pay day I was expected to find £400 cash in less than 24 hours. So between my parents, myself and my flatmate we managed to get the money together and my flatmate agreed to take time off to collect the car. The hire car was returned and I then received a phonecall from my flatmate to say she had refused to take the car back...
It had returned with holes in the paintwork worse than when it went in! When she had pointed this out and asked to speak to the manager. The manager had told her she had to take the car as it was and proceeded to use foul and abusive language to "persuade" her. For a woman's car insurance company, and in fact any other, I felt this was a disgusting way to be treated by the manager of a recommended garage. Luckily her boyfriend was there with her or she said she may well have just accepted the car out of intimidation!
I phoned Diamond who said I should speak to the manager of the garage myself, which I did, although felt as my policy was with Diamond and not the garage they should have done this. I was treated to the same abuse on the phone and then finally, once he had calmed down said the damage was not their fault it was faulty paintwork and grudgingly said they would get an independant engineer to look at this if I spoke to Diamond.
So back on the phone to Diamond who said they would arrange all this and I should hear from an independant engineer in 48 hours. Surprise Surprise I didn't so phoned Diamond again they told me they would send a fax straight away as the engineer hadn't been informed. Another 48 hours passed still no word so back on the phone again and all they would do was give me the number of the engineer.....
By this stage I am keeping a diary mainly to try and keep track of the different people I have been passed around to.
The engineer says he only received the fax that morning, over two days after it was supposed to have been sent, and would see the car today and let me know tomorrow. Engineer was true to his word and it turned out it was faulty paint but this was fine I accepted this and had an independant report I could go back to the manufacturor with.
So back on the phone to the garage to arrange for the car to be dropped off. They said they would drop the car off between 8-11 as my flatmate had to be in a meeting by 12. 11 came and went no sign of the garage, so she phoned them they said they would be there by 3 so she had to arrange for them to drop it to their work, 4.30 they eventually turned up. The guy refused to give a receipt saying there would be one in the post but my flatmate, quite rightly, refused to hand over £400 cash with no receipt so he eventually grudgingly wrote one.
I decided to write a letter of complaint as I was completly unhappy with the sevice I had received. My dad advised me to mark it for the personal attention of one of the directors but apparantly that information is not pubically available (I wonder why!) I wrote a long detailed letter with the sequence of events and eventually received a repsonse which in a nutshell was:
We have never heard of the accident management company who called you (how did they get all the details of my claim then?!), we have never had any complaints about the garage before and here's £35 we look forward to future business with you (really?!)
Overall I felt they did not give me the service I paid for, in fact they barely gave me a service at all. I had to arrange everything myself spend countless hours phoning a million different places and ended up with a car worse than when I started!!
Well if for some bizarre reason you decide that you want to take out a policy with Diamond you can find details on their website, www.diamond.co.uk
Oh and if anyone happens to live in the Middlesex area avoid a garage called GemCar at all costs!!
I think this may classify more as a rant that a review but I hope I got my point accross
thanks for reading
Maria
How helpful would this review be to a person making a buying decision? Rating guidelines
Sorry to hear you had such a bad time - good review though. I've just bough my first car and have been collecting quotes. The lowest of which was from, guess who....Diamond. I certainly won't risk going with them now. The next quote is that much more, so I may as well pay a few extra quid and hopefully get a better service - if I ever need it!
kismet 21.01.2006 09:27
It sounds like your problem was more with the garage than Diamond, but I do agree that Diamond should have sorted it out and reprimanded the garage. They should not deal with people who are intimidating to women if they sell women-only insurance! Good review. I am with Admiral myself, never had to claim yet, touch wood!
darkangelwing 26.12.2005 01:34
Thanx for the warning on a fab. critical review,very well written(-:
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Advantages: Excellent prices (obviously this won't apply to everyone), Willing to insure male partners as named drivers, Easy to get quote online, Call Centre helpful during office hours Disadvantages: Call Centre switches to a foreign call centre out of hours and is useless then!
angeelu 19.04.2004 (19.04.2004)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
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Advantages: Compact, easy to drive through the most smallest of spaces! Disadvantages: I only have the 3 door version so geting in and out of the backseats!
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