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If my car broke down a mile from home, I'd call one of the three garages in the village to come and get it. Then I'd walk home (either from the car or the garage depending on when they could get there).
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If my car broke down a mile from home, I'd call one of the three garages in the village to come and get it. Then I'd walk home (either from the car or the garage depending on when they could get there).
Exactly. If/ when my old car won't start at home I call my local indy. Come to think of it, if that happened half a mile away, I might do the same. I need Rescue if I am way from home somewhere in the sticks.
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It's amazing how many people scrimp on the basics, insurance, oil changes and servicing, tyres. Our neighbour went through France and switzerland last year without breakdown cover. 400 swiss francs towed to nearest BMW dealer.
We have start rescue with Homestart, over the course of a year, it's not a lot more included in the 5***** European cover.
Having read the terms and conditions I also like the bit where Start Rescue still do wheel changes when you have a puncture, (We have a full size spare)
It was a bit heavy yesterday when I wanted to get at something under the full size alloy spare.
leave it to the experts.!
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Had to call Start before Chistmas and really impressed with both the standard of the call centre staff and the recovery team who collected the keys and car from my golf club.
Everything went to plan and similarly my friend had a water pump jam on his VW caddy. They arrived within 30 minutes told him not to drive it as it could break the cam belt. Recovered to his garage within the hour using their superb app.
Wish Start had been around when I owned my Renault which was always breaking down!
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As already posted this isn't new. Home Start has been an add on for years, paid extra for it with my first car 30+ years ago. Once they make an exclusion they have to define a radius of 'home' where cover does not apply.
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Why is that not included as standard?
Unlike insurance, breakdown cover is not mandatory. If your car breaks down at home then it is not as much as emergency compared to if it were broken down 100 miles away from home in a motorway.
I agree that 1 mile is not a short distance by any means and any breakdown outside of your driveway is a hassle in its own right.
Companies don't offer it by default to showcase their cheapest rates.
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Could any breakdown company check if you gave a fake address? Not saying you should, but I'd be surprised if some people don't
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Could any breakdown company check if you gave a fake address? Not saying you should, but I'd be surprised if some people don't
When you pay, it will ask if the card is registered to the same address?
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Could any breakdown company check if you gave a fake address? Not saying you should, but I'd be surprised if some people don't
They can/do check where the car is registered - in any case almost all of us have an internet profile which can be checked.
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Maybe you live in one of those villages where everyone knows everyone and you call in favours from your mates or something, but for city life, especially if you've moved around a bit, a local tow might cost £150 which kind of defeats the point of paying for breakdown cover, and that's if you can even get anyone, certainly not in a hurry. All the local recoveries are contracted out to the big recovery companies, so anyone who hasn't got cover is bottom of the priority list, if they want that hassle at all.
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Having recently reinsured my Yamaha FJR 1300A here in France, i have a similar problem with breakdown insurance here. Most standard policies except bare third party only come with 25 km breakdown assistance as standard.
Ever tried pushing a 270 kg motorcycle - just across the yard?
So I have to pay extra for what is called 0 km breakdown cover.
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Is it worth not having home start?
Also make sure that your MOT is up to date, and your insurance too. There have been several cases recently in the Guardian (others available) wher assistance has been denied as they check when asked for assistance. The two cases in the guardian were both inadvertent.
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Home start is something i can't imagine ever needing.
I don't take my car to work anyway. And if I did and it wouldn't start, i'd just get a taxi or public transport, I wouldn't wait for a breakdown company who would take a long time to arrive then may or may not be able to fix it.
If it was a UK holiday it would be ruined without my car anyway. If it was something simple like a flat tyre or dead battery i could fix it myself, and anything complicated then breakdown probably couldn't do it either, it'd have to wait till the garage can look at it.
If it breaks down before something like a flight, by the time i've got the breakdown service out and everything running again, i'd probably miss my flight anyway. I wouldn't even waste the valuable time trying, i'd just get straight onto a taxi.
If feels like the 1 mile rule is just a trick to get people to pay for home start who don't want or need it.
Edited by beermattuk on 06/01/2024 at 21:03
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If feels like the 1 mile rule is just a trick to get people to pay for home start who don't want or need it.
It's not a trick - it's not a scam - they show you the options and you pay for what you want from the breakdown service. If you want home start then buy it, if you don't want it then don't buy it. Having a choice is not a scam.
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Did you even read my previous posts?
I DON'T want home start, but I DO want to be covered if I break down a mile AWAY from home.
Not covering me if i breakdown at the bottom of the hill, of which i have no way of getting the car back again, because i didn't pay extra for homestart, even though i'm not at home, that's the scam.
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Did you even read my previous posts?
I DON'T want home start, but I DO want to be covered if I break down a mile AWAY from home.
Not covering me if i breakdown at the bottom of the hill, of which i have no way of getting the car back again, because i didn't pay extra for homestart, even though i'm not at home, that's the scam.
Yes, I read them and it's still not a scam. You exactly what you pay for.
If you want to be covered for breaking down at the bottom of them hill then you pay for homestart. It is that simple. You do want home start despite saying you don't - would you prefer it is they had home start, less than a mile from home cover and over a mile cover?
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Home start is something i can't imagine ever needing.
If feels like the 1 mile rule is just a trick to get people to pay for home start who don't want or need it.
If you live somewhere where being able to access public transport, including taxis, quickly and easily is an option and/or the skills to get a car moving without needing a technician then all well and good.
Although I could see our nearest big town from my back window if there wasn't a house in the way buses are hourly and indirect. Taxis are better than they were 20years ago but they won't come out to the villages for a short journey without an extra charge.
The last three times I've needed attendance at or near home were a hydraulic leak on a Citroen Xantia, a flat tyre where I couldn't break the alloy wheel's corrosion to the steel hub and an electric issue that looked like massive overheat in the starter's harness but was actually electrolytic corrosion.
I'd have paid a lot to get those looked at on my drive without homestart.
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Exactly. I only have a Deauville 700 and that's not easy to push a few yards. Still a lot easier than my car though! Especially when towing!!
I can understand them putting restrictions on fancy features like outward journey etc within a mile from home, but to refuse to even tow you back home feels like a rip off.
Breakdown cover isn't essential, you're paying for peace of mind. Knowing that I could break down with a car full of camping gear and trailer half a mile down the road (at the bottom of a hill), at the start of a long weekend, and have to leave it there for a week while i shop round for someone willing to pick it up.... that's not peace of mind! The car, trailer, and all the contents would be looted by that time.
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I can understand them putting restrictions on fancy features like outward journey etc within a mile from home, but to refuse to even tow you back home feels like a rip off.
Compared to the other costs of motoring the cost of breakdown cover is proportionally low. I remember as a teenager our family having to sleep in my Dad's Cortina mkII overnight 5 up after it broke down on the M62 and we coasted off to a slip / roundabout road - and the next day we all had to walk into the nearest town and catch a bus home. It was a real pain/expensive for my Dad to recover it as well.
I gained two bits of life experience from this :-
- I have always had a good level of breakdown cover myself - even when I was ultra skint back in the day.
- First engine rebuild - Ford 1300 pre crossflow with melted pistons!
Edited by Big John on 06/01/2024 at 21:55
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I've never bothered with home start. The only time it could've been of use was when a diesel died a hundred yards up the road. Pushed it back with the help of a neighbour and it turned out the injection pump had 'lunched' itself. Still needed recovering to a 'competent' garage. The resultant tow was a fraction of the price of the repair - never had a diesel since!
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Considering that full cover for anything myself/wife drive or own costs only about £65 a year for everything except continental cover (not paying for that when we don't go abroad) I can only think that omitting at home would save very little. I don't see how it can be a scam when you don't get it simply because you don't pay for it. It would be a scam if you paid and did not get it.
Only used it once which was when I came to pull off the drive and a front spring snapped. Had to make the trip to Yorkshire in our other car but when we got back the RAC collected the car and took it to our local BMW Indy who was waiting for it. Getting it recovered privately would have cost way more than the annual cost for at home.
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