Collecting from Hethel on Monday and still not got insurance. Any recommended insurers?

[firstedition]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

 

[supersix]

Welcome to the forum @firstedition and congrats on a soon to be Emira Owner! Let us know your thoughts when you have some time behind the wheel.

 

[AndyVX]

Admiral multicar for me

 

[action_turtle]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

Whats the cost looking like? I havent even looked as the autos are not online yet. Why are they rejecting you? Is it the car?

 

[JohnHoward]

Whats the cost looking like? I havent even looked as the autos are not online yet. Why are they rejecting you? Is it the car?

They still do not have Type Approval for the auto, that is why you can't get quotes.

 

[JohnHoward]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

Have you tried confused.com, comparethemarket and the other comparison sites?

 

[action_turtle]

They still do not have Type Approval for the auto, that is why you can't get quotes.

Yeah, so badly managed. Any ETA on approval? I'm not even close to getting my car. July at the moment, but I'm assuming that will be pushed back yet again as I just can't see the build speeds improving.

 

[CDM1855]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

@firstedition presumably you are collecting a manual ?

 

[JohnHoward]

Yeah, so badly managed. Any ETA on approval? I'm not even close to getting my car. July at the moment, but I'm assuming that will be pushed back yet again as I just can't see the build speeds improving.

No info on when Type Approval will be resolved for the UK autos. Lotus will not give any info at all despite me asking on several occasions.

 

[action_turtle]

No info on when Type Approval will be resolved for the UK autos. Lotus will not give any info at all despite me asking on several occasions.

How do we insure it then? I just looked at manual costs, it's coming in around £850 a year!?! £400 more than my current car, but its my first sports car, so its to be expected, i guess. Do you just get manual and then pay more to change it to auto? wouldnt fancy driving this without 100% correct insurance. They dont want to payout at the best of times, i want no grey areas.

 

[JohnHoward]

How do we insure it then? I just looked at manual costs, it's coming in around £850 a year!?! £400 more than my current car, but its my first sports car, so its to be expected, i guess. Do you just get manual and then pay more to change it to auto? wouldnt fancy driving this without 100% correct insurance. They dont want to payout at the best of times, i want no grey areas.

My comments below relate to UK Type Approval only, approval processes vary by territory.
The simple answer is you can't!
Lotus are not allowed to sell the car without Type Approval in the first place. Insurance for a manual car would not be valid under any circumstances.
I've just had a look at manual insurance for interest (I am getting an auto) and the prices have dropped quite a bit now that the Emira details have fully filtered through all the insurers. My cheapest quote is £359 (with the RAC, via confused.com), which seems pretty good for an £80K brand new car (I pay £110 comp for my 8 year old Fiesta). Last year when Type Approval was first granted for the manuals, my cheapest quote was around £550.
The big problem for me as Type Approval gets delayed is that it takes time for the info to filter through all the insurers and you can see the effect of that with my two like for like quotes above.
Best guess for Type Approval delays is emissions and this is based on what happened with the manual cars. When they launched the Emira back in July 2021 the expectation was that the car would be one step below the highest road tax (or whatever it is called these days) bracket. But the manual car is in the highest bracket, indicating they couldn't get the emissions dialled low enough to maintain power output requirements.
The auto emissions are higher than manual, so they may be in a position where they have to sacrifice more power than they are willing to do to get the emissions low enough. As I said this is my best guess although it is based on some hard facts. After all the well documented emissions scandals of previous years with other manufacturers, I am sure that the government regulator goes over everything very carefully.
I may be wrong , I have been wrong before and have had plenty of practice at it! Time will tell.

 

[action_turtle]

My comments below relate to UK Type Approval only, approval processes vary by territory.
The simple answer is you can't!
Lotus are not allowed to sell the car without Type Approval in the first place. Insurance for a manual car would not be valid under any circumstances.
I've just had a look at manual insurance for interest (I am getting an auto) and the prices have dropped quite a bit now that the Emira details have fully filtered through all the insurers. My cheapest quote is £359 (with the RAC, via confused.com), which seems pretty good for an £80K brand new car (I pay £110 comp for my 8 year old Fiesta). Last year when Type Approval was first granted for the manuals, my cheapest quote was around £550.
The big problem for me as Type Approval gets delayed is that it takes time for the info to filter through all the insurers and you can see the effect of that with my two like for like quotes above.
Best guess for Type Approval delays is emissions and this is based on what happened with the manual cars. When they launched the Emira back in July 2021 the expectation was that the car would be one step below the highest road tax (or whatever it is called these days) bracket. But the manual car is in the highest bracket, indicating they couldn't get the emissions dialled low enough to maintain power output requirements.
The auto emissions are higher than manual, so they may be in a position where they have to sacrifice more power than they are willing to do to get the emissions low enough. As I said this is my best guess although it is based on some hard facts. After all the well documented emissions scandals of previous years with other manufacturers, I am sure that the government regulator goes over everything very carefully.
I may be wrong , I have been wrong before and have had plenty of practice at it! Time will tell.

thanks for the info. Having the car made slower is a concern imo. So what are people doing with these Auto deliveries then? Just asking for home delivery and leaving it to rot on their drive way? Noone is risking this car on UK roads with no insurance, surely? far too many idiots on are roads to do that! Also, what if it never gets type approved due to emissions, will it require a recall?

 

[JohnHoward]

thanks for the info. Having the car made slower is a concern imo. So what are people doing with these Auto deliveries then? Just asking for home delivery and leaving it to rot on their drive way? Noone is risking this car on UK roads with no insurance, surely? far too many idiots on are roads to do that! Also, what if it never gets type approved due to emissions, will it require a recall?

Lotus are not allowed to sell them without Type Approval. Any cars built will have to be stored by them or their logistics partner.

 

[action_turtle]

Lotus are not allowed to sell them without Type Approval. Any cars built will have to be stored by them or their logistics partner.

But haven’t people already picked their autos up?

During my moaning towards Lotus, they just sent my confirm config email lol. So I have now put my official order in. I await step 3, which is checkout. If they cannot hand this car over until the type approval I could be in for a bit of a wait. At least I know my car is now in the “to do” pile though. One step closer.

 

[Bilbao-Emira]

But haven’t people already picked their autos up?

During my moaning towards Lotus, they just sent my confirm config email lol. So I have now put my official order in. I await step 3, which is checkout. If they cannot hand this car over until the type approval I could be in for a bit of a wait. At least I know my car is now in the “to do” pile though. One step closer.

As far as we know, no Autos have been delivered yet anywhere in the World.
They started production of first batch in February, so we might see a few after PDI end of this month.
My bet is Belgium will be the first, as it happened with the manual back in September last year. And as per another post, two of them have been already offered from a dealer in Belgium, but not arrived yet, customer cancellations supposedly. Weird for all of us that have been waiting so long, but it happened before.

 

[JohnHoward]

But haven’t people already picked their autos up?

During my moaning towards Lotus, they just sent my confirm config email lol. So I have now put my official order in. I await step 3, which is checkout. If they cannot hand this car over until the type approval I could be in for a bit of a wait. At least I know my car is now in the “to do” pile though. One step closer.

No auto deliveries anywhere yet. The issue regarding Type Approval refers to UK only, other territories have different processes and rules

 

[action_turtle]

No auto deliveries anywhere yet. The issue regarding Type Approval refers to UK only, other territories have different processes and rules

okay, make sense. shame they have no visibility on the progress of the approval

 

[action_turtle]

As far as we know, no Autos have been delivered yet anywhere in the World.
They started production of first batch in February, so we might see a few after PDI end of this month.
My bet is Belgium will be the first, as it happened with the manual back in September last year. And as per another post, two of them have been already offered from a dealer in Belgium, but not arrived yet, customer cancellations supposedly. Weird for all of us that have been waiting so long, but it happened before.

Belgium can be the guineapigs on this then lol. I havent seen an Auto review, my test drive was a manual. So hopefully all good.

 

[Ian C]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

I went with AIB, it was not cheap but has new vehicle replacement and 30 day Europe cover , you will need a tracker

 

[Hobiedick]

Hello all,
On Monday I'm collecting my blue Emira FE with grey seats, diamond cut wheels, touring, full black pack, yellow calipers.
Was hoping someone could recomend an insurer cause I've had a few rejections.
Think I'll need a tracker to lower the price and I'm kicking my self now for not getting one factory fitted.

I pick my Magma Emira up on Monday too, I have insured it with Admiral Multicar with my other 2 cars, policy renews on 20th August and prorata cost was £217 which I think is good and no tracker required.