Ask Admiral? Never Again!

Advantages: Cheap premiums, good for younger drivers, UK call centre
Disadvantages: Awful customer care!

...My husband has a less than pristene driving career, 2 crashes exactly a year apart ruined any hope he had of gaining a half decent insurance premium last year. Luckil he has no driving convictions then when it came to renewal time in April 2005. After using one of the broker sites, husband came across Admiral's premium, considerably less than the nearest competitor of Budget Insurance. Admiral were quoting a figure of £430 per year for a fully comprehensive policy, covering husband and me in a Vauxhall Corsa Club ( 3dr1.0 12v, 51 Plate) for 10 months on one of their no claims bonus excelarator policies. Budget were quoting us £514, so Admiral were miles ahead in terms of price. This online quote gave Admiral a few assumptions, like we wanted to pay Annually, like our car was garaged overnight, like we wanted a £1000 excess!, so once...

memphisto_chick 28.05.2006 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

The Admiral's ship is not HMS Customer Service!

Advantages: cheaper than some
Disadvantages: more trouble than most

...I've been with Admiral for about eight years now. They've always been cheap (ish) and their customer service has been acceptable if not the most praise-worthy. However, an incident occurred when renewing my policy this year that made me see them in a whole new light. I had been running a Land Rover Defender with a separate insurer for a couple of years (one of the specialist 4x4 insurers) but decided to give Admiral a chance this year. I have two other cars, both insured with Admiral, and a third car adding to the policy should have increased my 'mutiple car' discount with them, so it made sense. Or so I thought. Upon asking for a quote for the Defender I was asked if the vehicle has any modifications. I replied that it had a raised air intake - not performance enhancing in the slightest (try improving the performance of a brick...

HokaHey 02.11.2007 (05.11.2007) · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Beware when claiming from Admiral

Advantages: Looks like a good premium deal
Disadvantages: just read the report!

...Admiral may look good when you're paying your premium, but the real test of a good motor insurer comes when making a claim - this is what happened to us. I'd like to register a big black mark for non-communication between departments, poor customer service, and some blatant porky-telling. I was recently involved in an accident where my car was damaged, but is still repairable. I was towed into the local main agents for Citroen who usually service the car. Citroen said that it was repairable, but could be quite expensive since a pipe to the radiator and the hydraulic system were damaged. Admiral said that the car had to be inspected and repaired by their designated repairers who collected the car 3 days later. On the same morning before they had even sent a report to Admiral, the repairers advised me the car was a write-off. I...

jennysue 13.03.2001 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Admiral - No Thanks

Advantages: Good if you have money to throw away
Disadvantages: unhelpful, expensive, slow

...I would not rate admiral as an insurer. I was with admiral for about 8 years. The first quote i had off them was fantastic. I had a new car and they were charging me £230 for a years fully comp insurance. I had no problems the first year. I got my renewal through for the next year and it had gone up slightly even though I had not had a claim. I rang customer services to check. They said the quote was right did I want to renew. They explained that even though I had not claimed there had been a lot of claims that year so this pushed up the price of the insurance. I checked a few others which were dearer so took up the insurance. Prices did not get any better over the years, I was told it was inflation, the amount of claims they had had the previous year!! I was being penalised for other peoples mistakes but I guess it was easier to stay...

shelleyone 29.04.2007 (21.07.2007) · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Admiral ... FIRST CLASS

Advantages: good rates, great customer service, quickly dealt with claim
Disadvantages: none yet

...We have had our car insurance with several different companies over the years - some big, some small.. But two years ago we switched to Admiral after getting a surprisingly good quote. We never have big, flash cars or even particularly new ones because of the mileage we do for the business (45,000 last year!), so it always annoys me when you have to pay a huge Insurance bill to cover a cheap car. Anyway, the girl on the from Admiral was very helpful, quick and polite and the quote we got was excellent. I was amazed at how much we saved from our previous company and they were only one of the smaller ones. The other plus point was that we paid no more for paying for it by direct debit. I have had to claim on the insurance once when our windscreen was smashed in by a vandal, while it was parked in a local outdoor NCP (I think...

nipples 19.02.2001 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Accommodation to Admire

Advantages: Clean, Tidy, Friendly and Welcoming at a great price
Disadvantages: Lots of stairs and No Lifts

...Usually, when I go away for a short break, I usually end up staying in Youth Hostels along with my husband. In most places they are just as good as low budget hotels, but not so in London. Last year we went to see Bon Jovi play in Hyde Park and stayed in this absolutely awful Youth Hostel, so when we discussed our latest trip to London, we both agreed that this time we would go with a "hotel". After much searching around online, it seemed that if you wanted to get a decent hotel in London, then you had to be willing to pay BIG money. Until I discovered TripAdvisor.com - they give reports on hotels from around the world, giving you personal experiences of the standards of the accommodation. To cut a long story short, we discovered The Admiral Hotel. After a name search on google, I discovered their website, and thought it looked...

Belfastgirl 17.02.2004 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of The Admiral Hotel, London

Admiral Review

Advantages: good price, even after claim. Easy claims process.
Disadvantages: none

...General Comments... This is the 1st year I have been insured with Admiral. Their prices have been considerably less than competitors, in fact this year my premium is about £70 cheaper than the nearest rival. This year I had a small accident, my fault where I hit another car. The claim was settled easily, the people I spoke to where all friendly and most importantly of all, I haven't been stung now I have come to renew. All in all I am very happy with the service I receive. I changed to Admiral after 3 months with my previous insurer as my previous premium was much higher. This is definately the insurance company to go with. Very good rates for new drivers, young drivers and males. Would highly recommend to everyone....

drdeg 12.05.2006 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Business stay at the Admiral

Advantages: Good location, nice atmosphere in the hotel
Disadvantages: A bit pricy, noise from traffic and noise from construction on the waterfront

...I stayed at Copenhagen Admiral Hotel for 2 nights during my visit to Copenhagen in late November 2005. I only stayed for 2 nights and my company used the hotel to host a conference. The hotel is located near the waterfront between Nyhavn and the castle of Amalienborg. We took a taxi from the airport to the hotel and I think we paid about 200-250 kroner for that. But I guess you can also take the train into the main train station and walk to the hotel but it is about 2 km to walk. When we arrived at the hotel we were impressed by the building itself. The main building dates back to 1787 and it was originally used as a storage and drying facility for wheat. Once inside it is impossible to not notice the huge wooden structures that carries the weight of the building (I assume that that is the purpose at least) and that also creates...

gard 27.11.2005 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral Hotel, Copenhagen

Admiral or petty officer

Advantages: few
Disadvantages: plenty if you are not a good driver

...These insurance companies that do business direct. What is your opinion? I find that it is possible to get a reasonable deal when you first approach them (new business-good quote!) but when it comes to renewals the premiums seem to escalate year after year. At first you might think it is inflation but experience tells you this is not quite the case. Then you wonder about heavy claims and whether they follow poor underwriting and guess who pays the price? personally I yhink they just try ro recoup enciuraging first low premium quotes on the basis that you will not bother to make the effort and move companies. not very admiral eh?...

REG 26.01.2001 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average helpful
Review of Admiral

Some ADMIRAL-able Qualities!

Advantages: Friendly, clean and well situated.
Disadvantages: A bit dated and wasn't really for us.

...Following on from my review on the Hotel Eden in Ghent, I thought I would write about the hotel we stayed in on our previous visit to Belgium. On this occasion we stayed in the Hotel Admiral in Ostende ~ quite a different hotel to the Eden in many ways?but, was it better or worse? Read on?.. ~~~WHERE IS THE ADMIRAL HOTEL? Ostende can be found in the West Flanders region of Belgium, not far from Bruges, and is a bustling little seaside resort. It is a popular holiday destination and also makes an excellent base for exploring Belgium ~ it has a good train station and provides a tram link to neighbouring towns and villages. The Admiral Hotel is located on Langestraat; a busy area of Ostende. It has a number of bars, shops and other hotels nearby and is only 100 metres from the main promenade (Albert Promenade) and sea front...

tange 08.08.2005 · Read review
Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful
Review of Hotel Admiral, Belgium