expensive car insurance 2010 review

Fully comp car insurance is often the cheapest – report
Startling research shows comprehensive motor insurance is typically much cheaper than third party, despite the fact it gives greater protection.

If truly representative, quite perversely, it means the better your insurance is, the less expensive it often becomes.

The research comes from Moneysupermarket.com which claims to have analysed 1.5 million insurance quotes.

Typical costs are:

* Fully comprehensive £400
* Third party fire and theft cover £560
* Third-party only cover would set you back £822
* Therefore, on average, fully comprehensive cover is over £420 cheaper.

However, those averages are considerably more expensive than most people should be paying.

The current record using the MoneySavingExpert.com system for fully comprehensive cover is £14 a year (see the Cheap Car Insurance guide).

While some may assume third-party cover is more expensive because those who are worse risks may disproportionately opt for it, this isn't necessarily true.

On a trial series of quotes for low risk drivers, MSE found it was common for the cheapest comprehensive cover to vastly undercut the cheapest third party price. One example was a quote of £290 for comprehensive, compared to £406 for third party.