My car recently changed numberplates and I rang to change it with SGIO. After spending considerable time navigating an IVR system I was told that they had recently changed their opening hours and they no longer opened on Sundays (very strange, I would have thought many cars were bought on Sundays). On Monday I called to check on my account. Much to my surprise, I was informed that they had cancelled the policy as payment had not been received 8 months ago. As I have my home and medical cover with them too, I thought it very strange that a) I had not been notified, and b) they had not tried harder to keep my account. Anyway, I asked them to re-instate the account based on the previous details as nothing had happened to my car since the policy had expired. I had to go through the fiull rigamarole of setting up an account and eventually I was told that it would come to $800 odd dollars and my new no-claims bonus would be 40%. 40% I asked?? it was 60% with them 8 months before. He said that was the figure, would I like him to proceed? I said no. I would investigate this further. I rang another company of similar repute and lo and behold the fee came to $500 odd dollars. They were polite and very nice to deal with (RAC in WA) (and open on Sundays too) I rang SGIO back (as it is handy to have all of your insurance with one organisation) and read my details back to the assessor. She could not find our house insurance and said that the fee was $1100. At that point I gave up in disgust and left SGIO which was a shame as my dealings with them in the past have always been good. Even so, we will investigate our other insurance to make sure that we are not being similarly exposed to excessive charging.
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