BelairDirect

BelairDirect recently took over Canadian Direct in Alberta. The reason why they are seeming cheap is for many reasons. Primarily, they will fight you every step of the way if you ever make a claim. I had to take them to small claims court to get them to pay for an accident repair to fix my vehicle. They hired a lawyer, flew out their claims manager to testify and made a pathetic offer of $ 500 to settle just minutes before court was in session. The judge sided with me for about 85% of what I was justifyably claiming and awarded me a judgement in the few $ 1,000’s.
There were a litany of other issues like refusing to direct pay for rental while car in for repair, purposeful delays and games, hiring an adjuster who made unreasonable demands to the repair shop like showing up unannounced and expecting a busy repair shop to just stop everything like the Queen had arrived, cater to him and being so rude and disrespectful to the repair shop, the repair shop didn’t want to do the repair and told me to tow my car elsewhere. The shop was highly reputable so I had to beg them to still do the repair.
They also like to trade your privacy for a quote by pulling your Credit Report. If you don’t accept the intrusion, they either won’t quote or will give you a highly inflated one. My advice is choose an Insurance Company that respects their customers and will actually pay your claim should you ever need it. Belair is no such company and its not worth the hassle just to get them to pay a claim that you’re fully entitled to. Belair is a zero star company.

I am a Canadian Direct Insurance customer and since BelairDirect has merged with them I am writing this review for them. I didn’t have any problems until I tried to pay my premiums up for the whole year instead of monthly debit, I gave my payment details over the phone and they just never took the payment, so I followed it up and then took the wrong amount and cancelled one of our policies in the mean time. I had wrong information from almost every person I spoke to and the last time I spoke to them one lady said that they are going to start monthly debits again and she transferred me to another lady who said they wouldn’t debit my account !!! They acknowledged fault the whole way and when I asked if there would be any recompense for all the mistakes or if this is just how they treat their customers they said they would get back to me and never did, SHOCKING customer service! Their cheaper premiums are not worth the hassle!

Horrible.
I’m a driver with no prior accidents, no parking tickets, I put snow tires on my vehicle every year, and I also participated in their Automerit tracking program.
After a year with Belair, I was forced to move. My new apartment is 4 km away from my previous apartment. My car insurance rates shot up over $ 700/​yr. There was no way to reduce the rate.
I shopped around for a new insurance provider and spoke to a Belair rep about what was involved in cancelling. At no point was ‘cancellation administrative fee’ mentioned. I found a better rate with TD Insurance and called Belair to cancel. You can imagine my surprise when I was charged over $ 250 in cancellation fees.
It seems odd that they can change rates as they see fit, essentially changing the terms of a contract, but when I’m unhappy with this and need to find a better rate, I’m penalized yet again. I guess I would have had to stay with Belair for another year to cancel with no penalty?
They also charge an interest rate when you pay monthly. Not all insurance companies do this.
What a horrible way to treat a customer.

About three years back, my sister and I both had our own at fault accidents. Both were because of bad weather. Neither accidents were extensive, minor damages to the other cars. We had one car fixed through insurance and the other since it was old, we decided to scrap it. Belair Direct raised my premiums and I paid, since it was justified. No issue there. Then all through the remainder of the year, last year and this year, there were no issues. I get a call today saying as of next year, they will not renew my insurance as both my sister and I have accidents on our names. Three years later just as my premiums were finally coming down. Really? Terrible policy.

I was involved in an accident where I was evidently not at fault. Sent them photos to prove it as well. Not only they condemned me to being partially at fault and destroyed my clean driving records, but after 10 years of being their royal costumer, they totally disregarded their «no premium change after first at fault accident» and increased my premium by 2.5 times.

I had car insurance with Belair for a year. Everyone told me they were really reasonable so I didn’t do much homework (my fault). In my 10 years of driving I have never had an accident. I got into 1 accident (very minor) and filed a claim which caused my insurance to go from 345 to 675 per month when my policy renewed (I wasn’t eligible for the first time accident forgiveness because I didn’t ask for it when I started my policy — nor did they offer it). They blamed the premium increase on a combination of my accident and my postal code being downtown Toronto. I shopped around and TD Meloche saved me $ 2500/​year and is charging me $ 238/​month for the same coverage! I called Belair to cancel and to ask why their premium was so high and the agent said they aren’t as competitive with their pricing as other insurers. Cost aside their customer service is brutal. Every time I called it somehow was increasing my premium cost, or there was something they couldn’t do, red tape all over the place.

I can’t believe I am writing a 4 star review of a car insurance company. I was in a no-​fault accident in the winter of 2014 and was unsure about how to proceed. They were also apologetic to my situation (I hit a deer). The customer service staff were excellent and walked me through everything. The auto shop they referred me to fixed everything up perfectly.
My rates did not increase, and when I had to cancel my insurance term earlier than a year, they refunded me money. They also said to consider them again if I were to lease or a buy another car. Very happy and will tell my friends all about them!

I would give a zero if I could!
I was with belairdirect for years, until I made a phone call to asking if they had personal training insurance. (As I was just starting a personal training business from home (work at home online). Well not even a couple minutes after they say we can no longer insure me.
I didn’t understand why, but what they had told me is that I am a high risk for using my car for commercial use. (for a home based business)
We had gone back and forth, I wanted to speak to a manager who they did not let me do, so I called back. Eventually when I got through I asked the manager to listen to the «quality control recordings» since they say everything will be recorded.
Well that didn’t happen either…
Long story short they told me they want nothing to do with me.
Then…Billing…
After having my CAR insurance cancelled on me (which was bad enough), and cancelling my home insurance. I kept on getting billed, for my home AND car insurance.
I had to cancel my credit card just because of belairdirect, and then guess what happens? Collection notices!
That money took about 6 month to get back.
Once again I wanted them to pull up my file to prove to them I cancelled my HOME insurance because I was furious that they cancelled my car insurance.
Overall found a better and cheaper car insurance company with english speaking customer service reps!
Long story short the WORST customer service I have ever had with ANY business.

I have my car insurance with Belair, and I have to say that they have the best customer service I’ve ever experienced. They are professional, but friendly and speaks to your level. They are knowledgeable, and if they don’t know they would send you to another person who does.
I’ve never had to wait longer than 1 min on hold, and no hang ups or rude people.
Although you can deal with one specific agent, it’s not really needed as everyone there can help and they are just as helpful, if not better.
All the dealings I had with them, including claiming something, asking questions, making changes to the account, was straightfoward and I can understand. Makes me a happy camper :)
Their rates was the cheapest for me at the time when I was getting my insurance. They have an include First Time Accident Forgiveness, which really comes in handy. Also all the paperwork and forms and things can easily be found online and most things are done electronically.
You can also get Aeroplan points from every payment!
I fully recommend them, if the rate works for you.