Youdrive Reviews 80

We took out Hastings Direct YouDrive because my partner is a learner driver, so she was the main driver and I was added as a named driver. The starting price of £43.84 a month seemed really good considering how ridiculous car insurance prices have become.

To be fair, the telematics itself worked fine. The app was straightforward and the scoring system seemed mostly reasonable. The only lower scores tended to come from things outside our control — people pulling out on us causing slightly harsher braking etc.

I’ve been driving years and I’m not really a telematics fan anyway (I like to think I know how to drive without being watched every journey 🤷🏻‍♂️), but in our case my partner had to mark when she was driving, so my driving didn’t really affect the score.

The thing that really annoyed us was renewal time.

Despite keeping the score above 90% for the year and doing exactly what they want you to do, the premium jumped from £43.84 to £63.75. At that point you do start wondering what the point of telematics actually is. We genuinely felt a bit mugged off — drive well, keep the score high, then still get rewarded with a price increase.

In the end the irony is we got a cheaper quote… with Hastings again… but WITHOUT telematics.

So overall: telematics worked, app worked, scoring seemed fair enough — but don’t assume driving well means your renewal will reflect it.

The app ins't fit for purpose. My wife doesn't have any NCB because she's always been a named driver on my insurance and has just bought her first car since the 1990s. Hastings gave a competive quote so she went with it.

Even though she has a 98% overall reading she been pinged a couple of times for harsh acceleration. This harsh acceleration was joining a motorway on an uphill slip. Perhaps Hastings would prefer if she drove the car to the very end of the slip and joined at 30 mph as it seems that is what they want.

It's very dangerous to put that into people's minds and perhaps all the idiots that do indeed join a motorway like that are Hastings clients. BTW until I retired I was an advanced emergency services driver and the wife has held a clean driving licence since 1984.

She'll not be renewing her policy with Hastings.

Very disappointed with Hastings Direct YouDrive insurance. The service is extremely poor and the app feels like constant monitoring with no real privacy for drivers. It tracks every movement and makes customers feel uncomfortable instead of supported. The driving score system is unfair and stressful, even for careful drivers. Customer service is unhelpful and slow when you need assistance. I would not recommend this insurance to anyone looking for fair treatment, privacy, or good customer support.

2nd day of my policy, braking too hard, going around round abouts too hard??? And constant mobile phone usage! 4 minutes 26secs I was apparently on my phone for!

Already threatening to cancel insurance this youdrive is inaccurate too sensitive and doesn’t not know anything about phone usage it just goes by the accelerator in your phone so you go over a bump or hit a pit hole your using your phone!!
When I get back off holiday I will be cancelling it! Wish I just read the reviews first!!

To be honest, I’m pleasantly surprised. I’m not a great driver but managed to keep my score at 96 so far (2 weeks in). It lets me use carplay without being told I’m using my phone and although I got done for braking in the first few days, it does actually help you anticipate what’s coming up so you can ease of the acceleration in plenty of time - better driving. The only thing is that I constantly look at my speedo which can be a bit distracting but, at the end of the day, I’m a brand new driver and pay £50/month fully comp insurance. I’ve had my licence 2 weeks. Can’t grumble.

I should’ve read the reviews before hand but never mind bought the policy through confused.com and Hastings cancelled it before it’s started and charged me £40 cancellations fee which was unfair and disappointing stay away please proper scummers

Not recommended! The data collection is inaccurate, the way the data is collected and reviewed is biased and not clear before you sign up for the policy. If your phone is not secured while driving it will record phone use. If any phone use is recorded, even of the driver is not using the phone or has phone on hands free, the scoring is in single digits. This is even if all other sections are fully green with little to no issues there for braking, cornering, accelloration and speed. The team will always reinforce that their data is accurate and will not take on board contradictions offered by the driver. They will take your money, make you worried about not attaining the score, (you start with a 0 rather than 100 - having to gain points rather than losing points for driving "infractions" And as noted perceived phone use cancelles out everything else) then cancel your policy! Avoid!

This is by far the worst insurance policy I’ve ever had. I only chose it because it was a few hundred pounds cheaper on a comparison site, but it hasn’t been worth it at all.

The system feels extremely unfair and overly sensitive. It seems to penalise you for normal, everyday driving behaviour. Even minor, reasonable reactions on the road can negatively affect your score. For example, something as simple as my partner selecting a song while I’m focused on driving has resulted in penalties.

Overall, the tracking and scoring don’t feel accurate or reasonable. I genuinely regret choosing this policy and won’t be renewing it. I’m just counting down the time until it ends!!!

If I could have left Zero stars i would!!! Insurance was cancelled yesterday after so much stress.
Pretty much the same as everyone else who's been ripped off and lied to....if you want to avoid non stop problems then avoid hastings direct.

I've now had the Hastingsdirect YouDrive policy and black box for just over 7 months. In that time, I have driven 6500 miles on a mix of motorways, A roads and a lot on very rural B roads. I drive a 2020 Land Rover Defender and so far my score from the app is 99. I have had a number of close calls on B roads where I have had to brake sharply to avoid cars, horses, HGVs and tractors coming in the opposite direction - hence a score of only 99 and not 100. Yes I have modified my driving since I have had the black box but not only has it clearly made me a better and safer driver but also saved me £400 on this year's premium. I am happy to have a cheaper insurance premium so that I am not subsidising those who drive too fast leading to sharp breaking, potential skidding around corners and who use their phone when driving. Wake up all those who give telematics a bad review - it's not the product at fault - it's your driving!

Do not go with this company. They will scam you. Pretend to say your data is not being shared only to cancel the policy early and keep the money

Daughter has had this policy for first year of driving. Averages 80+ constantly so no worries. Has a tumour in her arm which causes significant pain so drives when physically able - they know this and were notified 6 months ago. Her policy due to expire 12 April 2026 but they told her 2 weeks ago they were cancelling it on 18 March as telematics score had gone below 30 (9). We contacted them as she hadn't driven for 2 weeks until the 2 days prior to their communication. Even customer service were amazed at their decision as her average driving score remained at 80+ but they were adamant the cancellation process had been triggered and the telematics team refused to bend. I explained she'd literally have to crash the car to get a score as low as 9 but they were unrepentant. Official complaint lodged but up.to 8 weeks wait for handling. Worst of it is they advise if WE cancel the policy ourselves before 18 March it will not need to be declared as a policy cancellation. Absolute crooks and blackmailing to get out of renewing in 4 weeks time. Will not be letting this one go and am pursuing but hold little hope! Be cautious with this policy!

NEVER GO WITH THIS INSURANCE!!!
Canceled my policy as they thought that I could possibly be manipulating the black box. When trying to explain to them the simple and obvious mistake that was made they didn’t want to hear any of it and told me that the decision has already been made. I think if I had a ticking time bomb strapped to my chest it would have caused less stress to me than this joke of a company.

Stay away from this insurance company.
For some reason I didn’t know that they would send a tracker to record your driving data so 2 days later after I received a tracker I decided to call them to cancel the insurance because I didn’t want anyone recording my driving data and essentially my location also whisk driving.

I thought because it was only two days later which falls under the 14 days cooling period it would be free but I guess I was dreaming.

They charged me £25 for two days of nothing.
Absolutely ridiculous….

Interesting reading the terrible reviews.
Overall I've found the app quite reasonable, if a little sensitive.
The key to this app is you have to think like the algorithm. It's set up to be sensitive to over breaking, accelerating, cornering, speeding and phone use (the latter being the big points deductor).
What the algorithm is trying to do is get you to slow more at roundabouts, leave more space from the car in front etc.
It's a bit of a challenge to change your driving style to this if you don't naturally do that but once you start making the changes and get used to them, when cars pull up sharply in front, you still have space to slow down steadily and the same with roundabouts.
I see plenty of cars up grass banks on wet roundabouts, obv trying to hammer it...so again, that's why it has a cornering algorithm.
There are some things that you can't always avoid like idiot drivers making you break harder, but the app doesn't hammer you too much for that because if you're leaving plenty of space then it's an infrequent occurrence and the score is taken for an average of the whole journey. I do plenty on the motorway so for speed cruise control is the best friend, but everywhere else you just have to think more.
Mobile perspective, it works on phone movement as phones have a gyroscope so the app detects tilting etc and sees it as phone use, so I have android auto and the phone goes under the arm rest, still use maps, phone etc through the car with no issue as the phone stays still.
I'm 7 months in, about 12k miles and have a 98% ave.

One thing to note, I used my phone twice on one journey for a minute or so each as I was in a traffic jam and was sat stationary and thought I'd check other routes. My score for that journey was about 80% so that's where the main points are lost understandably.

Another noteworthy point is that you need to ensure that the app has all the permissions accepted on your phone, like activity tracking etc. If you don't have all permissions accepted, it may not work.

Overall:
If you want to save hundreds and are willing to steady up, leave more space, are willing to put your phone in a place you can't touch and dare I say it, drive a bit like Miss Daisy, this app is a good option.

If you can't steady up, like to get close to those in front, rush everywhere or are one of those I see on the motorway at nights who are either staring at their amazing glowing groin or more likely reading messages from a phone on their knee, then this really isn't for you. You're better shelling out the extra hundreds.

AVOID. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY.
My son forgot to set the app to passenger when I was driving his car on Saturday to pick him up from a football match.
He didn't want to drive home so I carried on driving back.
The app recorded him as driving and because he was using his phone whilst in the passenger seat the app gave a low score at the journeys end. The app said it had given him a low score(40) due to him using the phone whilst the app thought he was driving.
He received an email today saying they were cancelling the policy due to his average score going below 30. His average was 41 (due to his mistake) so where they got the 30 from is anyone's guess!
So I thought I would call Hastings direct and explain the error and everything would be fine.
How wrong was I !!!!
It would have been easier to negotiate with the GESTAPO.
They would not accept any of my story and simply stated my son must have been driving. The telematics clearly show the journey from where I collected him which is 12 miles from the address his vehicle is kept and registered to but no this wasn't enough.
I was left with the only choice but to cancel his policy.

If you make one small error with this company they will cancel at a moments notice.

Please save your time and effort and find a more understanding insurer.

The app and box are rubbish. Marks me down for hard braking and aggressive acceleration when i am driving very carefully.
Today i put car in sport mode and floored it, reaching motorway speeds ( on motorway) very rapidly. The app congratulated me for my great drive..🤣

THE WORST THING EVER.
Inaccurate over everything. Says i'm over accelerating when I have an automatic, says i'm cornering too hard going around ROUNDABOUTS and falsely accuses you of speeding during rush hour times where it is impossible for you to speed on the M4 during rush hours when you're not even able to hit the speed limit because the roads are so busy. They're not very helpful when you get in touch and they mark you down when someone else whose also insured to drive your car, drives it. DO NOT GET INSURANCR WITH HASTINGS

I went with you drive because it was the cheapest on a comparison sight and I was not bothered about using a tracking app.

However problems started when i tried to download the app and it wouldn’t work, I eventually found customer service phone number as all communication tries to push you chatting in the app.

The first time i spoke to customer services (the day i bought the policy) they were helpful and said it was a know issue, they would raise an it support ticket who would contact me and they would put a note on my file so they would not cancel the policy if I didn’t download the app until the issue was resolved, so far so good.

A few days later I received an email from IT support stating “if you download the app from the app store this will resole the issue, i am now closeing the it ticket”
Obviously this was useless so i replied that that wasn’t and it had a few questions back and forth (all of which the first customer service guy had covered.
In the meantime i recieved various emails and letters threatening to cancel my policy if i didn’t download the app in the first 14days.
The it department asked me to send them a video of my screen which i did via google and apparently they couldn’t open it so on day 13 of having a policy i called to cancel before they cancelled it.

I explained the situation and
The customer service department then told me they would be charging me for the black box they had sent and an administrative fee,
I said i was not happy to pay either as the app/box had failed to work and i had cancelled within the cooling off period.
They had to go and speak to a manager for about 10 minutes and then said they would cancel the charge for the box but I was told i was outwith the cooling off period because i had started my policy back in December (i was speaking to them in 12/1 and had taken out the policy on the 31/12.)
After me pointing out how the calender works she had to go and spend about 15 more minutes speaking to a manager to approve not charging me the admin fee (which would have been unlawful) before coming back to say they would refund it but could only make one payment a day so would make a £20 payment the next day.

To top it all off she started to close the call by telling me if i had any questions i should contact them through the app,
Proving she had not listed at all.

The tech support and customer service team seem to have no idea what they are doing and all communication has to go through an app that is hit or miss. The fact that customer services tried to charge me fees and disputed how dates work was mind boggling.

I will never use Hastings again

Honestly if I could have then I definitely would’ve given them something below 1 star because that’s how bad the experience and the customer service team were. I have been driving for more than 18 years and have been with multiple insurance companies but this by far is the worst one. I had taken out a Hastings You Drive policy for my son with my name on the policy as an additional driver. Every time my son had driven it was recorded as a great drive with a perfect score. However my son and I hadn’t driven the car for over 3 weeks and when I was driving after this brief period for 1 journey, without any warning or explanation they had cancelled the policy claiming the score had fallen below 30. My son had gone into the app to check his score and his score was above 70 yet they still claimed it had fallen below 30. When we had tried to dispute this they had no response and so started shifting the direction and making excuses such as I had more recorded journeys then my son who the policy was supposed to be for and let me tell you that claim was utterly false. Hastings You Drive is a total load of crap and they just scam you to extort your money. Would definitely tell anyone considering to buy a policy through Hastings You Drive to stay away and look for a policy someplace else otherwise you will regret taking a policy from them.