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1st Central: Car insurance reviews

Name: Car insurance
Rating: 1.5 (957 reviews)

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1.51

Based on 957 reviews, last reviewed 17th Apr 2026

100% increase in 5 star reviews

in the past 90 days

56% decrease in 1 star reviews

in the past 90 days

11%

80%

Latest highest rating:

5

Just started my third year of car insurance cover wi... Just started my third year of car insurance cover with 1st Central. Good value for money, helpful customer service, clearly laid out website and easy ... Read more Reviewed on: 17th April 2026

Latest lowest rating:

1

Do not use this provider for your car insurance I’ve had a very poor experience with this insurer. They failed to respond to three or four of my emails, and despite requesting a call from management... Read more Reviewed on: 10th April 2026

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About this product

With 1st Central, you can insure a single car or opt for a multicar policy. There’s also a telematics policy.

As standard, you get up to 90 days free cover when driving in Europe. There are five policies to choose from giving different levels of cover: ValueOnline, Online, LegalOnline, PlusOnline and PremierOnline.

1st Central car insurance reviews help you find out what it’s really like to be a customer. If you’ve used 1st Central before, you can also leave a review and share your experience.

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1st Central Car insurance reviews (957)

Shambles of a company STAY AWAY

Absolute shambles of a company do not use them stay away maybe cheap to start pff but lack of communication and awful to deal with when you have a claim Reviewed on: 26th April 2023

Terrible advice, terrible service

Called to insure new vehicle. Was advised to reactivate my expired policy (£307) and then change car details to new car (£212). Called back the next day to rectify this obvious mistake only to be told there was nothing they could do. I cancelled the policy immediately at a personal cost of £82. Absolutely appalled. Reviewed on: 26th April 2023

Ridiculous policy change prices

Awful, just awful. They quote cheaply but my goodness the adjustments are absurdly priced, complete rip off! Beware!! Reviewed on: 26th April 2023

Zero stars!!!

This insurance company is a MISUNDERSTANDING! The liquidation of the damage through no fault of my own takes more than half a year. Nobody replies to messages. No workshops in the area - yes for 4 months. The payment of compensation make problems and the other contracting company decides whether the indicated body repair shop can do it. They do NOT pay on time for repairs to the body repair shop. Workshop without payment will not return the car. Replacement vehicle problem, only for 2 weeks. Reviewed on: 21st April 2023

Charged an extra £280

Good luck getting any customer service. I Was subject to cloned plates in 2019, cloned vehicle caused a crash. Have a letter from police confirming. Every insurance company I have delt with use the letter to ignore the "fault collision" except this company! Now charged £280 for the privilege of having plates cloned, won't accept any evidence its nothing to do with me! Can't wait for the insurance to expire so I can go to a proper company. Reviewed on: 21st April 2023

Do not recommend

After the policy had been purchased and on the day of the policy starting they requested documents such as DVLA check code, pictures of driving license and a copy of the NCD, all went through fine and got approved. They requested a phone call so they could run through details with policy holder which is fine. On the call they proceeded to question the job titles which we had submitted for all 3 drivers, essentially saying that the jobs didn't exist and asking invasive questions about what we do at work and what type of job it is, etc, also asked questions about how many days a week the car is driven, how many miles a day, etc which we could not give accurate information for as the car is used differently every week, proceeded to give us an average mileage and said that didn't match the amount we had taken out on the policy (it was lower than the mileage on the policy), eventually the person on the phone 'had to make amends' to our policy and ended up charging us extra on top of our policy (in that extra amount was a £50 administration fee!!). We decided to cancel the policy as this extra fee now put our policy higher than other premiums with other companies, the call handler was incredibly rude and condescending and offered no help to rectify the issue. Reviewed on: 20th April 2023

Avoid like the plague

Would give them 0 stars if I could!!! Went for this insurer as they were competitively priced, but wished we hadn’t now! Sent two texts asking for documents and that they sent an email with the details. No emails were received. We emailed them and asked what documents. No response. Next thing we know we receive an email from them advising the premium was increasing by £23 a month due to the changes we had made. We had made no changes. After 2 unhelpful web chats one of which was ended by them they advised they had done a check and I had 3 points on my license (I have no points). Asked for a copy of my driving license and my partners and a copy of a DVLA access code for me. Provided this for them to say it had expired (it last 21 days and they tried to access it in under 24 hours it had not expired). Sent them a new one but then they wanted one for my partner as well. I did this and then they put me on hold for a long time to reverse the previous changes they made to the points. They then came back and said the day we past our tests did not match so the premium would be £10 more than it was previously quoted a month. Utterly ridiculous when you don’t put a date in when applying and just the month and year. Asked to speak with a manager to get the fees waived. Waited 30 mins on hold to get through for them to tell me this was not in their remit and would need to submit a complaint. What’s the point of having a management team when they can’t do anything! Just another way to infuriate your customers. I have already submitted a complaint yesterday when this all started due to the amount of time wasted, stress and anxiety caused and their standard of customer service. Also emailed them with details of my complaint and have received no acknowledgment. After the additional time waster today will send a further email and hold with bated breath for a response. Wish we could just cancel but at a charge of £169 that is not financially doable! Working in insurance myself I am so shocked at their service they really shouldn’t be running. Feel I will need to take this further to the FOS when they finally respond to the complaint and make it my mission to ensure that no one I know ever takes out insurance with them. Social media will be the next outlet to let as many people know to avoid! Reviewed on: 19th April 2023

Avoid at all costs.

Insured with this company in Feb, today received email claiming I am unemployed despite being in full time employment and my Dad, who is a named driver, is not an air con engineer but a motor mechanic! Total rubbish and accusing us of lying on the application. They are now cancelling the policy and demanding full payment of over £2000.00 or will send in bailiffs. Absolutely avoid like the plague. Reviewed on: 19th April 2023

Terrible Customer Service & Hidden Fees

We cancelled our car insurance 220 days into the policy and were charged a ridiculous amount which couldn't be explained by their customer service teams, as well as a heavy amount of interest + cancellation fee. Their staff were unhelpful and borderline rude, clearly an offshore call centre with no real ability to deal with their customers and don't value customer retention. Stay away. Reviewed on: 17th April 2023

Lure you in with cheap price then ask for more information and double it.

Took out car insurance with them on annual price was £394. They asked for more information so I called them. We have never been able to find my partners job on the drop down so put it in what we thought was the nearest thing. They decided it was something else and raised the price by £300!!!! When I said I cant pay it at once I would have to pay monthly as on maternity leave they said I couldn't pay monthly as had taken out an annual policy. So I asked for a refund so I could get insurance elsewhere and they took £140 in admin fees off my refund! Avoid at all costs!! Reviewed on: 17th April 2023

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