Review: Aviva Car Insurance
By
David Woodfield
Summary
Aviva is the largest general insurer in the UK, and can trace its history back to 1696. However, the ‘Aviva’ name – an invented word derived from ‘viva’, the Latin for ‘life’ – was adopted in 2002.
You can get a car insurance quote from Aviva's site.
The company has operations in countries around the world, and offers a variety of financial products, including insurance, pensions and investments.
One of the major players in the motor insurance market, Aviva’s policies are not available through price comparison sites. This seems to be because their policies have a large number of features so may be set up to appeal on quality rather than price alone.
Overview of cover provided by Aviva car insurance
As most motor insurers, Aviva offers two main car insurance policies: ‘comprehensive’, versus ‘third party, fire and theft’.
Comprehensive cover offers the most benefits, including cover for personal belongings, locks, windscreens and audio equipment, as well as transport and recovery services, medical expenses and cover for tools and child seats.
Comprehensive cover also includes Aviva’s ‘uninsured driver promise’, which means if you’re hit by an uninsured driver and it wasn’t your fault, your no claims discount won’t be lost and Aviva will refund any excess you’ve had to pay. Aviva also offers customers the option to guarantee their no claims discount for the life of their insurance policy, providing they have at least five years’ no claims discount, are aged 21 or over and have a minimum excess of £250 on their policy.
A number of optional extras are available for comprehensive cover, including legal support, enhanced courtesy car services, foreign use cover and personal accident cover.
Aviva car insurance is only available direct through the company. You can obtain a quote by visiting their website.
How much does Aviva car insurance cost?
As with all car insurance providers, it’s difficult to make generalisations about policy costs because they depend so heavily on the circumstances of the driver(s) buying, the car being insured, the area they live in and so on. However, since Aviva’s insurance products aren’t available on price-comparison sites you can be assured you’re getting their best deal by going straight to the company itself.
Because Aviva offers a number of driver guarantees, such as no claims discount protection and their uninsured driver promise, the policy might seem more expensive but it is also worth bearing in mind that these features could save you significant money in the long run, should you ever need to make a claim.
What do Aviva’s customers say?
On Aviva's website, it says more than 5,000 customers have given it an average score of 4.5 out of 5. The company has an average score of 1.1 out of 10 based on more than 500 reviews.
And its car insurance scores 4.33 out of 5 from over 190 customer reviews on Smart Money People.
What do the experts say?
In a review by Which? that reviewed 30 different car insurance providers, Aviva ranked 6th overall, formed of a customer score of 64% and a Which? policy score of 75%, creating an overall score of 69%.
According to Fairer Finance, which rates companies based on factors such as transparency and complaints handling, Aviva ranks 14th among UK car insurance providers, earning a Fairer Finance bronze award with an above average score of 61%.
