MOT Exempt Vs breakdown

As far as I know the big recovery agents have no age limit on policy. My RAC Cover has come out to my old chod before. The exception is Green Flag who indeed will not attend anything over 10 years. I believe this is just due to their cost ceiling, GF are cheaper than most and I imagine to do this they ‘turn away’ anything seen as older and unreliable, falling into your banger category, to avoid eating into their profit going out to everyone with a Nissan Almera with no oil in it or Corsa C with a flat tyre.
I think really all it says is check your breakdown cover before you purchase to make sure you are actually covered.

I didn't realise that about Green Flag. worth knowing as I have a 9 year old car. I won't be renewing my subs with them.

Interesting about Green Flag, when I used to have breakdown cover as part of my Norton Insurance classic policy, it was "Green Flag Heritage Rescue".

I had the RAC out to mine, and I was worried about the stories about how they'd be wondering where to plug the laptop. Couldn't have been more different, chap has a Mk1 Cavalier convertible and a classic Mini at home, and was very helpful indeed. Like neilsdavies earlier, I had some parts with me (though it turned out not the right ones), but I was in a very difficult spot and didn't fancy being under the bonnet when something came around the corner and didn't notice me.

I have AA with the MGB, the only problem I ran into was some places wouldn't insure an old car (they said it had to be classic).

A few weeks ago my brother had his '76 MATRA-SIMCA Bagheera cut out completely on a busy slip road. He called the AA who were there very quickly as he was stranded in a pretty dangerous place. The AA guy who turned up already knew what the car was and, after getting the car to a safer spot, said he was an old car enthusiast and really enjoyed working on it and similar stuff (despite the Bagheera's near zero engine accessibility). After trying various other bits, he spent ages rebuilding the distributor with bits from one Kev carried as spares and got it running spot on. Superb service and he asked Kev & Lesley if he could take a photo of the Bagheera when he'd finished.

Just remembered one tow back with RAC! I'd just put the big motor in the Beetle and taken it to Shakespeare County Raceway for what turned out to be their final event. Had a couple of runs on the Sunday and then set off home, but it was losing power and sounding like it was not running on all four cylinders. I limped it in to Hopwood Park services and popped the rocker cover off to find all four lash caps sat in the bottom of the cover, all four valve clearances open wide and couple of push rods hanging out. Slackened off the rocker shaft and found one of the studs had snapped off completely so I took all the bits, put them in a box and called the RAC. I explained what had happened but they said they had to send a patrol before a low loader, and apologised for wasting my time but it was protocol, as the low loaders are sub contracted. Patrol gets there, asks to see the problem so I showed him the box of bits and said that unless he could remove a broken stud in situ I'd need a tow... nice chap, we had a laugh about it and he called for the truck that ended up taking me home.

Yes, I could quite imagine that a large proportion of people who call in and claim to have "checked everything" actually haven't. It's frustrating if you're waiting on the side of the road for hours, but it's understandable from their point of view.

I initially picked the RAC because, at the time, they covered the person in any car, and the AA only covered the car. Sounds as if the AA have changed that stance now, so when I get to renewal time I might have a look around again.

I was recently told a tale by someone, and it'd be interesting to hear if anyone else had a similar experience. This is a third-hand tale - the chap who told me about it wasn't who it had happened to, so there may be some rounding errors. I also don't know which breakdown service it is, but one of the major ones.

Chap goes to Germany, in his rather unusual Vauxhall Vectra, towing an Austin 7 on a trailer. Vectra has a problem en route, which I think was traced to the clutch slave cylinder - regardless, it can't be fixed in Germany for some reason. Chap calls his breakdown service, explains the situation, they then have a think about what they're going to do. After some messing around, this turns out to be: we're going to write the car off in Germany, because the value of the car is less than the cost of trailering it back to the UK, along with the Austin. Chap gets upset (as you would), drives home in the Austin 7, drives back to Germany in another car, and tows it back himself.

Presuming no exaggeration, it's a sobering tale and would make me do some double-checking before presuming I could go abroad and my car would be recovered if anything went wrong.

call the AA... you will end up speaking to real ordinary helpful people...not someone on the sub continent with barely even a minor grasp of the basics of the english language!

cant fault the aa. ive only ever called them out twice but on both occasions managed to fix the issue myself or with a passer by. swmbo as associate member has also called twice (for an otherwise reliable focus) and was recovred swiftly without issue on both occasions. not a bad call out rate in 34 years!!

Because I'm an ex civilian worker for the MET, I'm a member of the CSMA, which gives me cheaper breakdown with Brittania rescue, they've always been great when I needed them, even with my Six wheel rrc, and will send me a recovery truck immediately on my say-so, like most of us on here I pride myself on ability to fix at the side of the road.