the mozo blog

Only a month out from the second annual Mozo People’s Choice Awards, where we unveil the best Australian financial institutions as rated by their very own customers, we have just added car insurers to the Mozo ‘fame or shame’ list.

Mozo’s car insurance section is now bursting with the ratings and reviews of over 3,500 real customers from the Mozo community – rating Aussie car insurers on price, features, convenience, service – the whole shamozzle.

Now, for the first time, you can compare comprehensive car insurance on not only product features, like no claim discounts or choice of excess, but you’ll also see exactly what existing customers think of their policy.

Of course, with all those ratings also come rankings – the best and worst of the car insurance scene – and we’ve tallied them up for all to see. Check out the crème de la crème below…

Top 5 Car Insurers (with 30 reviews or more)

1. Shannons: 8.9 out of 10
2. Apia: 8.8 out of 10
3. Youi: 8.3 out of 10
4. Suncorp Insurance: 8.3 out of 10
5. Real Insurance: 7.9 out of 10

Congrats to specialist insurers Shannons, who are narrow leaders of the Australian car insurer showdown – scoring big for their “dedicated service for car enthusiasts”…

‘Pros: Easy to get to on the phone (not waiting for 1/2 hour), polite phone staff, question free claims, not bugging me every month with sales crap. Cons: A bit more expensive than the internet style insurance companies (eg: insuremyride)’ – Brenton from SA

Not far behind, Apia also scored big with their over 50s customers, whilst for the non-specialised insurers, it was great to see new players Youi and Real scoring very well. In position four, Suncorp was the first in the list of the multi-talented banking/insurance providers.

When I had an accident, YOUI were very quick in responding, the customer service person is very sympathetic and knows how to handle the situation, she was so helpful, friendly and sent me a little gift pack as I had a very traumatic experience – Michelle from VIC

We think this is a great tool for all Aussies looking for new car insurance (or just checking how their current insurers stack up against the competition). So next time that policy of yours is up for renewal, be sure to compare car insurance on Mozo.

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Join the fight! Rate your bank or car insurer now to help decide the winners of the Mozo People’s Choice Awards for 2011.

20,000 bonus points and 4 free flights every year. Sounds good, right? If your enthusiasm is matched by your scepticism, you wouldn’t be alone – free lunches are rare, especially in bank-land. The good news is that Virgin are certainly making this lunch pretty damn cheap.

What’s on the menu?

- 20,000 bonus velocity points (if you spend $5,000+ within the first 3 months)
- Four 2-for-1 Virgin Blue flights every year (if you cover the credit card fees)
- A 6 month intro balance transfer rate of 2.90%
- Travel accident insurance and concierge service

What’s it worth?
A flight from Sydney to Melbourne will cost you 9,800 velocity points, so the bonus 20k points will bag you two one-way tickets. To earn the same amount of points you’d have to spend at least $20,000. Add to that the four free flights each year and you’re looking pretty good.

Compared to other cards on the market, factoring in the free flight and bonus points, it’s a clear winner for domestic travellers. Check out our rewards revealer for all the details.

The bill
With an annual fee of only $99 it’s an especially cheap platinum card, even better when you consider all the goodies.

In the doggy-bag
Bonuses are great, but at the end of the day you are left with a tempting piece of plastic, so it’s worth knowing how it fares as a day-to-day credit card:
- Interest rate of 20.99% and 44 interest free days
- Earn 1 velocity point for each $1 spent up to $1,500 a month, 1 velocity point for every $2 after that.

If your stomach is grumbling, check out the Virgin Flyer Credit Card on Mozo now.

It’s not yet been a week since Mozo’s VICE Presidential race kicked off, and already Australians have confessed to a quarter of a billion dollars worth of spending sins. Who knew you were all so profligate?

Well, we kinda suspected…

But the big surprise has been the vices themselves, with Gadgets taking the lead on $77 million, closely followed by Shoes & Clothes.

Seems we’re a nation of chic geeks.

So what ever happened to the party-hard Aussie yobbo? After a strong start, Booze has drooped to a groggy $15m, and Ciggies are only coughing up $4.5m.

Of course, it’s early days yet, and having stepped over more than one xmas reveller on the way to work this morning, Mozo thinks there are a few sinners holding out on us…

So pop an aspirin and join the race to become Australia’s first VICE President.
http://mozo.com.au/vice-calculator

That five grand – and limitless kudos – could be yours!

Dear Mozonians,

Do you know how much your Vices are costing you? If you’re anything like us, you’ve got no idea just how bad it is. All those coffees each week, the shoes clogging up your cupboard, the night on the drink that mysteriously drained your whole bank account – and let’s not even get started on Christmas and New Years.

Truly, we are a viceful people.

But here’s the good news: We’re looking for Australia’s First Vice President! That’s right, we’re going to reward the vices you try so desperately to hide!

Simply head to our Vice Calculator, tot up that vicious spend and come up with a campaign promise to smite your vice. The candidate with the best promise will win $5000!

Follow the campaign trail on Facebook and Twitter to read and vote on your rivals’ promises, and be sure to boost your supporter base — get your friends to vote for you.

The VICE President will be inaugurated on Australia Day — so join the race and start campaigning today!

Team Mozo

Electoral Regulator

Yet another RBA announcement looms. Apparently someone (God, Galileo or the Greenwich Mean Time Monster) has organised calendar dates in an effort to inflict as much pain on borrowers as possible – seriously, how can there be so many Tuesdays in every month?

In light of this startling revelation, we thought it would be a good chance to gauge the thoughts of the mortgage community who are, unfortunately enough, staring down the barrel of 18 months of gradual pain.

To make this amazingly easy for us, The Daily Telegraph have put together a short survey around Tuesday’s meeting, which can be completed at this very clickable green link. For those of you in the community who think the Reserve Board is out of touch, or would like to pen an imaginary message to RBA overlord Glenn Stevens, then you will find this a convenient, interwebs based soap box.

So despite the cash rate reaching 50 year lows, and staying that way almost long enough for even the most indecisive property owner to fix a pretty special rate, the Monetary powers that be are again falling back on their old tools. Now it appears people must brace themselves for a good, healthy dose of monthly electroshock therapy. Let’s just hope it ends better than it did for Jack Nicholson.

Need help with the pain? Compare Home Loans with Mozo to find a better a deal.