# Breakdown Cover/ Roadside Assistance, AA, RAC etc? Who do you use?



## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Hey Guys,

So basically the situation is, I need to get some form of cover.

I only really know AA, RAC and Greenflag?

Who are you with? What do you pay? What is covered?

I need 2 cars covered and really only want it to just be towed home if broken down or towed to a garage if on a long Journey.

Cheers


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## Kimo (Jun 7, 2013)

Rac

Don't pay as I have lifetime membership but whenever I've needed them they've always arrived super quick


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## millns84 (Jul 5, 2009)

We've got RAC on the family wagon with the insurance - Only needed them once and they were there in around 20 mins.

I've also got AA cover with my bank account - Never needed them yet and hopefully won't.


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## Andyg_TSi (Sep 6, 2013)

I'm with the AA.

With the AA, It's not the car that's covered, It's you personally. 
So it doesn't matter what car I'm in, I can call out the AA.

I'm a gold member with Roadside & Relay cover, so roadside assistance & if can't be fixed, then towed.

Been with the AA since 1999.


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## tyreman (Jan 28, 2007)

Speaking from "inside" it may be nice to have an established name in breakdown cover, but like everyone they get busy and subcontract the work out,and there's certain situations where they won't attend straight away,but ask a contractor to move the vehicle to a place of safety.so knowing what I know I'd look at the cheaper options like Insurance choice.


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## davies20 (Feb 22, 2009)

As above - I used to work for Mansfield recovery & often I would drag a car off the hard shoulder of the m6 to the nearest services for the AA! Then the customer would wait for a proper AA recovery to turn up, sometimes hours!

AA covered there arses as I we were there within an hour & technically you were safe, so how can you moan technically?! 

Also watch milage allowances - I did ALOT of greenflag work and the amount of people that only had 10/15 mile recovery was untrue - and you don't want to know the millage charge if you want to go further than that!!


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## danwel (Feb 18, 2007)

I change each year and go via topcashback for a decent money off deal


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## Darlofan (Nov 24, 2010)

I've used Autoaid for about 7 years now. £38 covers mine and wife's car including home cover. It has an excess where if used I pay first £45 so if your car is reasonably reliable it pays off. I used them earlier this year for iirc 2nd time ever and they turned up within 35 mins and took me to a nearby tyre place (had blow out). 

Best thing I love about them is when I renew it each year I ring up and it takes literally 30 seconds on phone. They confirm your details and that's it. None of this press 1,2,3,4,5 then loads of crap about security, card details etc and have you thought about upgrading to our platinum, diamond cover rubbish. Just a simple "that's done, have a nice evening".


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## andy665 (Nov 1, 2005)

Andyg_TSi said:


> I'm with the AA.
> 
> With the AA, It's not the car that's covered, It's you personally.
> So it doesn't matter what car I'm in, I can call out the AA.
> ...


I'm with the RAC for the same reason - last time I checked AA covered the vehicle not the customer - just checked and thats the case


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## Tricky Red (Mar 3, 2007)

I'm with RAC for both me and the wife - about £110 for us both with everything except European cover which I got stung on when I had to take it out before our trip. But there you go. 

Haggle - I got £50 off by saying it was cheaper for new customers.


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## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Looking at both RAC and AA, they have the option of covering the person or car...from all the other sites I've been on, they all have that option too.


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## Andyg_TSi (Sep 6, 2013)

andy665 said:


> I'm with the RAC for the same reason - last time I checked AA covered the vehicle not the customer - just checked and thats the case


Thought it was me that was covered & not the car.....confused now, will have to double check.

Last time I had to call them out was 2001! Lol


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## Kimo (Jun 7, 2013)

Rac cover the person not the vehicle

Well, they do on mine anyway


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## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

Just to clarify, it depends on your cover, they both do both...look:

AA









RAC


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## Kimo (Jun 7, 2013)

I see

I've just had cover since my day of birth tbh so never renewed or anything 

Just know that all 3 times I needed them, they arrived within 20 mins


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## possul (Nov 14, 2008)

tyreman said:


> Speaking from "inside" it may be nice to have an established name in breakdown cover, but like everyone they get busy and subcontract the work out,and there's certain situations where they won't attend straight away,but ask a contractor to move the vehicle to a place of safety.so knowing what I know I'd look at the cheaper options like Insurance choice.


They subcontract the recovery side, but thats recovery. An employee will only ever look at the car.
Its also a safety thing, if it means getting you off the hard shoulder of the motorway or away from a busy dual carriageway. 
Highways agency do this to aswell


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## Rayaan (Jun 1, 2014)

Im with AA on their full cover for both me and my wife. Got it free for 3 years when I bought a new car 10 years ago and ive kept renewing it as it only costs me £115 to renew. I needed to use it three times, came in less than 20 minutes on every occasion!


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## Certi (May 5, 2011)

I've just taken out breakdown cover with RAC for my motorbike. It was only £35 after cash back with Quidco. Greenflag wanted £75 which supposedly included 3 years no claim discount!


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## davidcraggs (Aug 1, 2007)

Also Autoaid - £41 for both of us, any car and includes home start etc. Never used them but Which? still rate them highly even if AutoExpress don't rate them as highly as they used to.


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## nokia (Mar 3, 2009)

Nationwide Flexplus account.

£10 a month - can be a joint account so cover for people

Breakdown cover - personal based not on the car - national recovery home start etc all in
Family travel Insurance
Family mobile phone cover
2 year warranty on white goods

Cannot be beaten in my opinion.

http://www.nationwide.co.uk/product...e/flexplus?aggregator=1&cmpid=Aggregator_2222


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## tyreman (Jan 28, 2007)

possul said:


> They subcontract the recovery side, but thats recovery. An employee will only ever look at the car.
> Its also a safety thing, if it means getting you off the hard shoulder of the motorway or away from a busy dual carriageway.
> Highways agency do this to aswell


Not always the case,I'm often asked to investigate and report,and then depending the breakdown/location and or work load depends whether I fix,recover or leave it to the breakdown company,there never seems to be set rules !


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## PugIain (Jun 28, 2006)

I pay £18 a year to Greenflag for recovery to a garage/home if I'm over a mile away.
Never used it, so can't comment on service.
It used to be about £26 a year, but due to not making a call out in the last 2 or so years they gave me a "no claims" discount. Win.


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## Sicskate (Oct 3, 2012)

We have AA through our lloyds platinum account, it's £17 a month but that is for the whole platinum package. 

I used it for the first time last week, the guy arrived in 20 mins and I was on the road 5 mins later, so I was happy.


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## Bill58 (Jul 5, 2010)

I'm with Greenflag for recovery from anywhere in UK to a garage of my choice. This costs £47. PugIain that is a good deal. The £26 offer for me was only recovery for up to 10 miles or to the nearest Greenflag approved garage so no use to me if I'm at the other end of the country.


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## 182_Blue (Oct 25, 2005)

Greenflag for me, i did AA for my parents once and got loads of email and loads of phone calls trying to sell me other services, i vowed never to go with them again!.


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## uruk hai (Apr 5, 2009)

I'm with Start Rescue, never had to use them so I couldn't honestly say what they're like for time or service. Use to be in the RAC but got fed up of already quite costly premiums constantly climbing and after reading the entire Ts&Cs of my current cover I know there is basically no difference. In fact the two sets of terms and conditions were exactly the same but I now pay about half the price.

Obviously the proof of the pudding will be in the eating but I've never needed them so far. I did have to call the RAC out twice, once they took about an hour and the second time I got a contractor who had absolutely zero interest in being helpful so I saw no reason to pay a premium for nothing like a premium service, hence the change of service provider.


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## s4sprint72 (Apr 3, 2015)

I get AA with my bank account, but it only covers roadside assistance - not recovery. So I'm with GEM (Guild of Experienced Motorists) telephone 08459645505 or 01342825676 Mon-Fri 9-5 or www.motoringassist.com. I think you may have to have a clean licence to be a member, but not sure. They cover you in any vehicle, accidents included and don't care how old you or the vehicle are, which is very important if you drive a classic car.


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## s4sprint72 (Apr 3, 2015)

One other incentive to choose GEM, AutoExpress has rated them #1 for the last five years running. They also provide a free accident management service as part of your cover, but it isn't compulsory to use that.


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## Ducky (Mar 19, 2007)

I have GEM, they recovered our car when the engine light came on at my brothers house 110 miles away, delivered back to our house that same night (well 3am in the morning!) Woke up to find the car parked outside. :thumb:

Not many would recover that far, usually they try for the local garage. 

Def recommended!


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## Starbuck88 (Nov 12, 2013)

A friend I spoke to has a Nationwide Current Account.

He says he gets breakdown cover, mobile phone insurance, lost keys insurance etc, all for £10 a month.

He used the breakdown cover twice in 1 day and they towed both times to different places so I think that's pretty good.

Me and Mrs have been together for 10 years this year and still don't have a joint account, so this might be the way forward!


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## staffordian (May 2, 2012)

Some manufacturers offer it "free".

I have a SEAT and if it's serviced by the dealer and the service is booked online via SEAT, they chuck in 12 months European cover free. So although the cost of using a dealer might be more than an Indy I think the saving on breakdown cover more than compensates for it.


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## Radish293 (Mar 16, 2012)

In my professional capacity I deal with lots of breakdown organisations the only one I would pay to join is Green Flag.
I've always found the drivers from all companies to be top notch but the admin and control rooms from the two big players can be questionable. One will always make an excuse not to attend.


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## Alfieharley1 (Jun 8, 2014)

staffordian said:


> Some manufacturers offer it "free".
> 
> I have a SEAT and if it's serviced by the dealer and the service is booked online via SEAT, they chuck in 12 months European cover free. So although the cost of using a dealer might be more than an Indy I think the saving on breakdown cover more than compensates for it.


My Renault Twingo is covered for 4 years breakdown with the RAC


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## nbray67 (Mar 22, 2012)

Free AA cover with our bank account, so far unused, but we know it's there should we need it.

Having a new Renault means we have a certain level of cover thru them, what, I don't know, again, hopefully never needed!!


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## XtrailAndy (Oct 14, 2013)

Been with the AA for the last 14 years, and they have been great until this year.

Back in February the Crankshaft seal failed on the X-Trail, so phoned the AA and out came the yellow flat-bed to transport me to the garage I use. After dropping the car off I was left stranded, 27 miles from home, on a Sunday afternoon.

Luckily, Alec who owns the garage came out so we could store the car inside until he opened up on Monday morning, he then gave me a courtesy car so I could get home.

In the past the AA have always made sure I got home, even if my vehicles were dropped at a garage, looks like things have changed.

Will think long and hard about which breakdown service I go with next year.


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## Clancy (Jul 21, 2013)

Been with the rac 3 years. Only time I needed them they were good 

Car ate it's gearbox about 300 miles from home. Sent a mechanic to check it within an hour (although I did say there's no point it's dead, they insisted) he was was tthere2 minutes then ordered a recover truck to take me home 

only took 12 hours


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## possul (Nov 14, 2008)

XtrailAndy said:


> Been with the AA for the last 14 years, and they have been great until this year.
> 
> Back in February the Crankshaft seal failed on the X-Trail, so phoned the AA and out came the yellow flat-bed to transport me to the garage I use. After dropping the car off I was left stranded, 27 miles from home, on a Sunday afternoon.
> 
> ...


Were you broken down or picked up from home?


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## XtrailAndy (Oct 14, 2013)

possul said:


> Were you broken down or picked up from home?


Broken down, matey...the crankshaft seal failed about 6 miles from home, I was lucky enough to spot the oil flooding out whilst parked up in car park.

Like I said above, in the past the AA have always made sure I got home, regardless of the circumstances.


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## possul (Nov 14, 2008)

XtrailAndy said:


> Broken down, matey...the crankshaft seal failed about 6 miles from home, I was lucky enough to spot the oil flooding out whilst parked up in car park.
> 
> Like I said above, in the past the AA have always made sure I got home, regardless of the circumstances.


I would of thought they would of taken you home and then taken the car unattended.
They have recently employed about 80-100 new patrols and you may have had one of those. Hopefully a one of, regardless of company


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## ffrs1444 (Jun 7, 2008)

Use my bank lloyds extra £17 a month holiday insurance, Key cover , baggage cover etc


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## nokia (Mar 3, 2009)

ffrs1444 said:


> Use my bank lloyds extra £17 a month holiday insurance, Key cover , baggage cover etc


Nationwide beats this. £10 a month lots of cover


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## richaccord (May 14, 2015)

Don't forget Tesco does good deals for RAC:

Cheapest is £18 in clubcard vouchers for a single roadside annual cover with RAC.

http://www.tesco.com/clubcard/deals/browse.aspx?N=4294967150+4294967079

I've also had my cover with Green Flag, they look at the reliability stats of the car, so my Honda worked out very cheap to cover.


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## VAG-hag (May 14, 2012)

I just joined ADAC which is pretty much German AA as I visit mainland Europe regularly enough. Covers me in any car, cover is very comprehensive and the customer service is top draw.
AA covers you while in UK. <£70 pa. and should I stuff it on Nurburgring they will merrily scoop up the car but I believe they draw the line at mopping up tears. I did lots of research prior to signing up and they have a good rep.


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## Mike_Wizz (Aug 5, 2013)

I have a hsbc advance account which provides breakdown cover had to use it twice this week they are pretty helpful


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## danwel (Feb 18, 2007)

Mike_Wizz said:


> I have a hsbc advance account which provides breakdown cover had to use it twice this week they are pretty helpful


Check level of cover, does it include home start?


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## Mike_Wizz (Aug 5, 2013)

danwel said:


> Check level of cover, does it include home start?


Erm just checked no... 1/4 of a mile from home...


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## danwel (Feb 18, 2007)

Mike_Wizz said:


> Erm just checked no... 1/4 of a mile from home...


Just curious, I was thinking of upgrading my current account but I like fir piece of mind home start for my wife as I work away.


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## nokia (Mar 3, 2009)

Nationwide FlexPlus Account


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