twopintsandabagofcrisps

I wonder if anyone can help,

I've been making some enquiries about getting my husband (Canadian) insured on a car in the UK and most companies wont even talk to me, even if he is a named driver on my insurance.

One other thing I have noticed, is that even though I have been driving for 20 years which is 10 years in the UK and 10 years in Canada without incident they cant give me any no claims bonus...

Does anyone have any car insurance companies that they recommend to use on our return from Canada to the UK?

spouse of scouse

Try Aviva. They equaled our Australian no claims bonus, although we needed a letter from our Oz insurers. Aviva have also let us put our Aussie housesitters on our car insurance for the 6 weeks they'll be here, as they both have International driver licenses.

twopintsandabagofcrisps

Thanks Ill try them.

lf1

Another one to try is NFU. They accepted my Canadian claims experience record (provided by my Cdn insurer) and my driving abstract from the Ab govt when I returned to the UK. They also accepted that I would be driving with a foreign license for 1 year.

Novocastrian

+1 on Aviva. They had no issue with Canadian licenses and recognised the NCB on presentation of a letter from our Canadian insurer. This was in 2015.

Note that a Canadian license when swapped for a UK one will come with an automatic only endorsement.

spouse of scouse

I wonder why these strange rules - when I swapped my Australian license, which only allowed me to drive an automatic, I got a UK one that let me drive automatics, manuals and motorbikes

mikelincs

Maybe that was because the Australians drive on the correct side of the road

Novocastrian

The DVLA assumes that US and Canadians will have taken their tests on an automatic. If you indeed passed on a manual then you have to prove it to them.

Perhaps DVLA are a bit out of date though.

spouse of scouse

Them's fighting words, Mike!

spouse of scouse

Either out of date or crazy. I wouldn't know one end of a gear from the other!

Novocastrian

Hmm. I'm back in France at the moment, we have two cars here. One that we drove here from the UK which is an auto because my OH passed her test in North America and is therefore considered incompetent to drive manuals

The other (French registered) car is a manual which she prefers to drive since she's never driven an automatic for the four decades before we returned to the UK.

Mad I tells yer.

Rete

Yes, they are. My husband is a born and raised Canadian and has only ever driven a manual in Canada and in Europe when he was stationed there for 16 years and here in the US for the last 19. Thankfully, the US license doesn't specify which type transmission you can drive.