Find out all about Budget car insurance policies and see what customers think of their service
Defaqto rating: 5/5 stars
Independent assessor Defaqto awards Budget a high five star score for its private car policy.
Note: Not all Defaqto five-star rated products have the same covers and terms.
Feefo rating 4.6/5 stars
'You've done a lot to make customers happy with your site,' said one reviewer. 'Even though tough questions were asked, it's for the good of everyone to be upfront when declaring details,' they added.
Other Feefo reviewers praised the lack of jargon when applying for car insurance and the clear, patient customer service advice experienced.
Budget Insurance was awarded a Feefo rating
of 4.6 out of five based on 1,200 verified reviews.
Budget car insurance is backed by car and motorbike insurer BISL Limited, part of the bigger BGL Group. Budget describes itself as an independent intermediary 'dealing with selected insurers'.
Budget has a short-term car insurance offshoot tagged Jaunt. Jaunt offers online car insurance from one hour to 30 days.
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Budget’s comprehensive cover includes protection from uninsured drivers and any excess will be refunded. There’s also up to £300 of cover towards replacing a child seat. Be careful when refuelling – there’s no loss or damage cover from putting in the wrong fuel, diesel or petrol.
Plenty of flexibility is offered and it’s easily possible to add extra protection – personal accident cover or lost keys, for example – to any policy. But there’s no theft cover if car keys are left inside while your car’s unattended. Nor is there wear-and-tear related key cover.
Although Budget Insurance emphasizes the simplicity of their product range it is also well-regarded (see 'How good is Budget Insurance car insurance?'). Budget claims it has attracted nearly 3m customers in total. However there’s no ‘black box’ telematics product currently (July 2020), dragging innovation down somewhat.
Between 1 July - 30 September 2020 anyone buying a new insurance policy via the Budget website or over the phone receives a £30 Amazon voucher.
Possibly younger families who like a promise of up to £300 per claim towards the cost of replacement child seats
If you want a flexible level of standard of cover including 60 days of cover in the EU
You need cover to drive other vehicles (though you will still need the permission of the owner)
You want the reassurance of cover in case your car is involved in an accident caused by an uninsured driver
Budget’s contact centre is open Monday to Saturday, 8am-6pm, and Sunday, 10am-4pm, with a 24/7 claims line. There’s also a webchat service available Monday to Saturday, 10am-4pm.
There’s an online My Account service available 24/7 where you can make payments, amend your policies and view and print all your insurance documents.
During the Covid-19 pandemic Budget says it made additional breakdown assistance available to key workers at no extra cost. It also pledged to provide a guaranteed replacement vehicle for eligible key workers in the event of an accident.
The Financial Ombudsman Service received fewer than 10 complaints about Budget motor insurance in the first half of 2020 (that could be just a single complaint). But Budget is also part of BISL, which received 76 complaints. To put that in context, 67 firms had 10 or more complaints each and those totalled 4,550 complaints. Nearly 200 firms had fewer than 10 each, sharing just 479 complaints between them.
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