To be fair, car insurance in the UK was a joke before we had ambulance chasing lawyers. It's never made sense and it's always cost more to renew with the company you're with than move to somewhere else. Just before we didn't have comparison sites and the insurers used to be smart enough to price renewals at just enough more that it wasn't quite worth the (at that time significant*) effort of changing. Now it's virtually no effort to change, so their scheme is knackered. They just haven't realised it yet. Because they're basically stupid.

(* hard to believe now, but circa 15 years ago I used to have to take a day off work so I could ring round various insurers to get quotes. Now I can do in seconds on the internet.)

That is similar to when the mobile phone networks operated deals for new customers only while people wanting to re-new got shafted.

Once more I come across yet another good reason to move to France. As I'm unlikely to ever hit the threshold for their new 74% tax rate I'm starting to seriously consider it. I know the Wench would move there in a heartbeat.

Well that is a bad policy as well. I got a massive £102.50 back on my new iPhone 5 so even though I am tied into Three for 2 years, the overall cost is minimal over the cost of buying outright. My plan is in two years is to switch to another provider for another year getting another £50 cash back on a one year deal, before getting a new phone with a big cash back bonus in three years time.