My car insurance was due for renewal. I took out a policy many moons ago with DirectLine. The intial insurance was taken out online and each year they send me a renewal notice in the post before it expires. This year's renewal notice arrived a couple of weeks ago. All I have to do is ring up and agree the renewal, provide payment details and I am all done. So far, so good. However, this year I thought I would check the renewal amount (the one in the letter they sent me) with their website. Just for fun. Guess what! The online quote was over a £100 cheaper than the renewal notice. This can't be right, I thought.
When I rang up to point this out, I was put through to the customer loyalty department and they matched the online price. Apparently, there is an online "discount".
How can this possibly make sense? This episode really underlines how important it is to get multichannel delivery right. This episode was not about MONEY, it was about TRUST (my trust in DirectLine) and customer loyalty. As a loyal customer (yes, I have been with them for many years), my reward was an over inflated insurance premium (one that was higher than the online equivalent). Surely as a loyal cusomter, I deserve the best quote not just one that they think they can get away with. I can't help feeling let down. It is almost as if the company is spending all of it's time trying to attract new customers while failing to look after it's existing customers.
All I want is to be treated as a loyal customer. If you give me your best deal, I will give you my business. If you give your best deals to your least loyal customers (i.e. those who give their business to others currently), your most loyal customers will reward you - by moving their business elsewhere!
