Car Insurance

I've a better one than that - some years ago, my car was stolen, luckily enough, recovered by the Gardai 3 days later with no damage, so that was that, or so I thought. Naturally enough, being car-less and the victim of a crime, I alerted my insurance company straight away and commenced an insurance case. 

They sent an assessor the day after to do a report, no messing about, and that was as far as the whole thing got, because it was recovered & returned to me 2 days after that.  As the car had no damage (it was inspected by their assessor and I had the choice of getting my own assessment FOC if I disagreed with their fella, I didn't disagree, so that was the end of that) , I rang them and cancelled the claim. 

And thought that was the end of it, until some months later, my renewal was due. My insurance had gone up because I had commenced a claim (which, by my insurance policy, was the correct procedure in the eventuality of having a car stolen, keeping the company updated at all times etc) , and my no claims bonus had disappeared as well. Bear in mind, I had not claimed or received a single cent from them at any point. 

There was also the issue of them putting in on the Cartell website (which I have access to in work) as a stolen vehicle, which was fine, but it was still there a few weeks later, no idea what possessed me to check my own car, but for whatever reason, I did, and seeing it listed as stolen weeks after it was returned, I contacted them to remove it. 

They refused to acknowledge they put it there in the first place when I challenged them (they blamed the Gardai, a quick phone call to them confirmed it wasn't them; when I brought this to their attention some weeks later, they still wouldn't tell me who put it there) , eventually it disappeared after about another month of phoning every so often to ask them why they hadn't removed it. 

You would think this is fairly simple stuff, but until I pointed out to them that I had not claimed anything, they were quite prepared to double my premium over it. At this point, and the Cartell thing was really annoying me (If I had decided to trade the car in at the time, not a single motor dealer in the country would take it with it being red flagged as stolen) , and their appalling customer service, I had lost all confidence in them & decided to move companies no matter what the cost. 

Which was grand, until they illegally withheld my full no claims bonus, despite multiple requests, and they kept sending me one that had the words 'claim outstanding' at the bottom, which naturally enough, any prospective insurer would want to know about. After the threat of legal action, they eventually conceded that I had no outstanding claim, nor any intention of proceeding with one (this was some 4 months after my car was returned & I has signed off on a form saying I was satisfied with the condition of the car on inspection) , they eventually sent me the documents I required the very day before my insurance expired. 

And for all that, I was probably lucky, while all this was going on, I had found an alternative insurer and some fella in their office I was dealing with was sympathetic to the crap I was putting up with (he even gave me a few tips on wording ''requests'' to the old company, only for the chap, I would have likley been stuck with the existing fcukers like some of ye mentioned. 

Have mentioned before the 3 main things are Quinns going bust (private gambling debt, paid for by the taxpayer in the form of an insurance levy), insurance fraud, which is massive in this country, and the learned lads on the benches of the courts awarding lottery type figures, or figures appropriate to their own standard of living, for reasonably mild run of the mill injuries. Having said all that, the behaviour of the insurance companies themselves, or at least some of them (the above case, won't mention any names, but if ya can count as far as three, you might think of it) is appalling, and certainly wouldn't make you think they are anything much better than the cowboys arranging the fake car crashes for fraud purposes. 

I'm actually angry as f**k having read that. And I'm sure there's even worse stories again that people on here will have.

Currently doing a course for work, now my employer said they will cover my travel expenses as its a 90km round journey daily for 25 days but they want a letter from my insurance company saying I am covered to use the car for work purposes. Think this is a bit of a red herring from my employer as i may be hit with a hike in my insurance premium if i request a letter and my employer is using this so I wont claim my expenses.
Any suggestions?

Going from an old banger to a slightly less old banger is not going to make your premium reduce.

If you'd bought a new car your premium would come down, because statistically, brand new cars have less collisions.