Breakdown cover and insurance.

insurance on both my cars was up, the Boxster by quite a lot even though that was going from one to two year's NCD (my "full" NCD is on the Jag). Comparison sites offered not much of a saving so I left it. ISTR it was a circa 50% increase. 

Renewing car tax on both car for £695 each, a couple of months apart, was more of a shocker - I had not taken in that it had changed.

Servicing is well up as well - my last two XFR annual services have been £588 and £688, for a long time before that they were circa £350-£450. Nothing happens apart from an oil and filter change. It's a fairly big increase and no suprise as dealerhsips are really struggling to find staff, and presumably having to pay them more.

It’s a complete piss take. Insurance companies are profiteering on the back the cost of living excuse. Needs investigation.

What Lotus have you got Brian?

I had an Elan SE which I bought used and did over 100k miles in. I ran that as a company car. I sold it and bought a new Elise. I only kept that 18 months/2 years or so as although it was great to drive when road conditions were good it was a nightmare when the were not plus every time I took it out something broke or fell off it and that did get tiresome. I still have a soft spot for Lotus but I think they've moved waaaaay out of my price range.

Googling tells me it's all perfectly understandable, insurance was too cheap in the past and no one is getting rich out of this. Maybe these claims needs to be fact checked 

I'm with Start Rescue. The times I have had to used them, they have been fine and sent a local agent within an hour.

They cover our 07 MX-5, did cover my 2000 Discovery and have just added the Range Rover no problem. Total renewal for the two cars is £116.

They won't cover the pickup so I use LV Britannia Rescue for that which is £70 for the year including European cover.

I’m with ford assist - it used to be free if you got your car serviced at a ford dealer. I think it’s £20 a year now

With Tara’s rav4 and my mums wheelchair car , we just go here

www.moneysupermarket.com/breakdown-cover/

Put in what cover you want , and go with the cheapest one that has defaqto 5* . Don’t be put off if you haven’t heard of the firm either - My SIL got towed home from near Middlesbrough to the midlands once so they do what they say they will, and much cheaper than the AA/RAC

There is an argument that with the AA they might try and get you going as their vans have tools and you get an actual mechanic but that's only if you breakdown during the day. Otherwise them and the RAC sub out your recovery to a local firm who won't even look at your car they will literally just recover you. You also need to check what sort of recovery option the quote gives. You don't want one that dumps you at the nearest garage with no onward travel options.

Breakdown cover for the Golf is with the RAC via my current account.

Insurance never makes sense. I was running a couple of cars through the comparison sites last night and the prices were a lot higher than similar cars I’d looked at a couple of months ago, between 50-100% increase). I re-ran mine out of interest and the best price was £1,800….I paid £880 a couple of months ago!

The other strange thing is NCD. The quote I had for zero NCD assuming it would be a 3rd car, came out at 10% cheaper than the one with 10 years. Probably because I didn’t tick the ‘protect NCD’ box, so a saving there, but still a surprise.

I had a couple more problems with mine. I had a hole in the floor and a dash mount broke and the dash fell about an inch on the drivers side. the dealership (the one on the Felling bypass which was a V'hall / Lotus garage) were no help and just told me to find a boat repairer. A more annoying problem was that the windows went slack and when I shut the door they'd bow out which meant wind noise and in the rain it just poured in. When parking up I had to push each window in so that it bedded nicely into the surround rather than bow out in front of it. This was another issue the V'hall garage had no interest in fixing.

I did enjoy that Elan though and it only went because of the mounting issues which the dealership didn't seem interested in fixing and the mileage and of course the Elise caught my eye. I bought my Elise from them on the Felling bypass too but thankfully they lost the Lotus franchise and it moved to another place in Newcastle. F1 something or other?

I've been lucky with breakdowns. My company Sierra gave endless trouble but never actually stranded me anywhere other than at home and although my company Montego died in the rain once I was only ten minutes walk from home so that's where I went to phone for recovery. I walked back to the car and it started first time and never did that again so I drove home and cancelled the recovery.

My Elan SE did strand me once when the gear change cable snapped and I waited over 4 hours for recovery. After that whenever the cable snapped I drove it on the unaffected gears. The only other time I needed recovery was when My Elan SE was rear ended by a girl in a Golf and the car wouldn't start again. The impact was quite heavy and the car crumpled to mid rear wheel arch and the spare was forced through the boot wall into the car but the main reason it wouldn't start was I learned later that the impact had triggered a crash detector switch and that switched and killed everything. At the time I didn't know the switch existed and where it was but I don't suppose the car would have been driveable even if it had started. They came quite quick that day.

These days I don't tend to go far but I suppose it's better safe than sorry.