Comparing
Comparing quotes checklist
Before you buy, write the event, collect the PDS and schedule, align excesses, limits, exclusions, waiting periods and listed people, then compare only the premiums those configurations produced. If a row does not match, you are ranking different products.
- Order
- Event, documents, mechanics, quoted premium
- Fail
- Unmatched rows are different products
- Cash test
- Can you fund the stacked excess?
- Last question
- What happens if I cancel or complain?
Direct answer
What questions should you ask before buying insurance? Start with the event you need paid. Then ask whether each quote’s Product Disclosure Statement would actually pay that event, for the people and objects you will list, at an excess you can fund, after waiting periods, after exclusions, at a limit that is not an underinsurance trap. Only then compare the premiums those insurers offered you for that configuration.
This checklist is the worksheet version of how to compare. It is general information, not a quote engine and not personal advice. Fill every number from documents you were given.
How to use the sheet
Open two columns (or ten). Each column is one quote path — insurer site, broker, bank, or a future comparison tile. Rows are questions. A cell is an answer you can point to in a PDS or schedule, or a flag that says “different product”.
Do not put premium in row one. Premium is the last numeric row, and it is allowed only when the rows above are either matched or consciously accepted as thinner.
Print it, duplicate it, or copy it into a spreadsheet. The questions do not expire. The answers do — wordings and your risk change.
The master checklist
| # | Question to line up | Why it decides a claim or a price | Where the answer lives |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | What event am I buying? | Category names are not events | Your four-line brief |
| 2 | Which layer of product is this? | Comprehensive ≠ third party; hospital ≠ extras | Product name + PDS “what we cover” |
| 3 | Who or what is listed? | Unlisted people and objects change claims | Application + schedule |
| 4 | How is the thing used? | Business, rideshare, landlord, commuting | Application |
| 5 | What is the payout basis? | Agreed vs market; indemnity vs new-for-old; rebuild | Schedule + definitions |
| 6 | What is the sum or limit — and any sub-limit? | Underinsurance and portable-item caps | Schedule |
| 7 | Which excesses can stack on my event? | First-loss cash | PDS excess chapter |
| 8 | What is excluded under another name? | Flood vs storm; pre-existing; adventure sports | “We will not pay” |
| 9 | What waiting or qualifying period applies? | Week-two claims die here | PDS tables |
| 10 | Which extras did I add? | Add-ons are extra products | Configurator + schedule |
| 11 | How do I claim, and who repairs or pays? | Process and mobility | Claims chapter |
| 12 | What did I already buy elsewhere? | Super, cards, landlord, phone plans | Your inventory |
| 13 | What happens if I cancel mid-term? | Refunds and fees | PDS + funding contract |
| 14 | How do I complain? | IDR then AFCA for many GI products | PDS + FSG |
| 15 | What premium was I quoted — today, this config? | The only comparable price | The quote you received |
None of those rows contains a figure we invented. That is deliberate. See our methodology.
Questions 1–4 — the brief and the application
Write four lines before you open a form:
- The event (storm, at-fault smash, hospital admission, vet surgery, customer injury).
- The object or person.
- The money you can fund the day after (excess stack, weeks without income).
- The cover you already have.
If line 4 already pays the event, you may be shopping for a duplicate. Bundling and overlap are how households pay twice for one promise.
Application answers are not trivia. Listed drivers, occupations, renovations, previous claims and overnight parking are the risk. A cheaper premium that depends on an incomplete list is a future decline. Australians have a duty to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation. Guessing “no” to win a slider is not a comparison technique.
Type hubs that apply the same brief to a category: car, home, health.
Questions 5–7 — money that is not the premium
Payout basis changes the cheque. Agreed value versus market value on a car, rebuild versus a sale-price guess on a house, indemnity versus replacement on contents — these are different products. Underinsurance is what happens when the limit is theatre.
Excesses are a family. Standard, voluntary, age, inexperienced, event-specific and percentage amounts can add. Read excess vs premium and do the ugly sum for the event in question 1. If you cannot fund it, stop ranking.
Questions 8–10 — the thin bits that make a price look kind
Search the PDS for “we will not”, flood, storm surge, actions of the sea, pre-existing, wear and tear, unoccupancy, and the sport you actually do. Exclusions and what is a PDS are the literacy pair.
Waiting periods are the time version of an excess. Health, pet and income protection live here. Waiting periods explains why a lower premium can be a longer sit.
Optional extras (rental car, windscreen waiver, portable valuables, pregnancy on travel) must be on or off in every column. Mixed extras make mixed prices.
Questions 11–14 — after you buy, after it breaks
Ask how you notify a claim, whether you must use an approved repairer, and what a not-at-fault smash looks like if the other party is uninsured. Claims basics is the map.
Ask how unused premium is refunded and whether a cancellation or funding fee sits in another contract. Switching is the order of operations: new policy on risk, then cancel.
Ask where complaints go. Internal dispute resolution first; AFCA for many general-insurance matters. MoneySmart is the consumer-language companion.
Question 15 — the only premium that counts
Use the number that came back for your answers, on that day, for that configuration. Do not:
- paste a forum anecdote
- reuse last year’s renewal as a market index
- treat “from $X” as personal
- ask this website to invent a figure (we will not)
If two columns still will not match on rows 1–14, you may still buy the thinner product — but you must say so out loud. “I accepted a flood exclusion to lower the premium” is a decision. “This tile was cheaper” is not.
A worked (hypothetical) pass — no live prices
Imagine two car quotes for the same hatch and the same adult drivers.
- Column A: comprehensive, both household drivers listed, agreed value, windscreen extra on, standard plus voluntary excess written on the schedule.
- Column B: a lower premium, market value, one driver omitted, windscreen as a standard claim, and an inexperienced-driver excess that will apply when the omitted person drives.
Those columns fail rows 3, 5, 7 and 10. They are not two prices. If you “save” on B, you have bought a different payout and a different stack. Fill the dollars from quotes you receive; the educational point is the fail, not a winner.
The same pattern appears in home (flood included versus excluded; rebuild figures that differ by a large margin) and health (waiting periods and clinical categories that do not match). Check current government health classifications on PrivateHealth.gov.au rather than our adjectives.
Stress-test the cheapest remaining column
When only like-for-like columns remain, take the lowest premium and ask:
- If the event happens in week two, does a wait kill it?
- If every stacked excess applies, can I fund it without a fire sale?
- Is the event excluded under another name?
- Did I answer the form in a way a claims team could call a misrepresentation?
If any answer is uncomfortable, the cheap quote is unfinished. What affects premiums explains other levers that can move the number without changing the event.
Commercial tiles and this domain
A comparison site, including this one, cannot see your full risk from a postcode and an age band. Any future “Compare offers” button here goes to Compare offers and is a documented stub until a partner is contracted. It is not a ranking and it does not replace the sheet.
The disclaimer is the legal version: general information, possible future commissions, no invented prices.
Extra rows for health, home and travel
The master table is generic. Add rows when the category demands them.
Home. Flood / storm / surge as separate cells. Rebuild figure and the date of the estimate. Alternative accommodation sub-limit. Unoccupancy condition if you travel. Pair with home insurance.
Health. Hospital versus extras. Clinical categories you actually use. Which waits port if you switch. Check PrivateHealth.gov.au the day you compare, not a memory of last year’s tiers. Pair with health insurance and waiting periods.
Travel. Destination, dates, sports, pregnancy, who paid for the fare (card extra activation), and cancellation for a known event. A cheaper last-minute policy can be a different known-event product.
Do not let those extra rows live only in your head. If they are not on the sheet, they will lose to a large premium number.
Comparing quotes like for like — the price angle
What does like-for-like mean when the question is price? It means you are allowed to rank two invoices only after every row that forms those invoices is either matched or consciously accepted as thinner. “Same car, same postcode” is not like-for-like. “Same event, same people, same layer, same excess stack, same limits, same extras, same waits” is.
Price is formed from the factors on what affects premiums: who is listed, where the risk sits, history, cover layer, excess, limits and extras, plus book-level costs you cannot slider. A comparison website that asked an age band and a suburb has frozen almost none of those rows. Treat that tile as a start. The sheet above is the rest of the job.
Like-for-like is also the only honest answer to “which quote is cheaper?”. If quote B uses a higher voluntary excess, omits a P-plater, pays market value instead of agreed value, drops windscreen, or sits on third party while A is comprehensive, B is not cheaper. B is thinner. You may still buy B. You must say the thinness out loud. The how to lower premiums spoke lists the legal levers — and the misrepresentation paths that are not levers.
Work the price block in this order, after rows 1–14 are filled:
- Clone the configuration. If you are shopping a renewal, start from the current schedule, not from a blank tile. Diff people, sums, extras and excesses first. See why premiums increase if the letter is the reason you opened the sheet.
- Move one lever only when you mean to. An excess experiment that also unticked hire car is not an excess experiment. A contents experiment that also dropped portable cover is not a contents price.
- Write the total you will pay, same payment frequency, including any funding fee that sits in another document. A “lower premium” that is a higher annual total is not lower.
- Refuse folklore. Neighbour prices, forum threads, last year’s letter as a market index, and “from” banners do not enter the last row. The car cost spoke is a framework for motor rows, not a typical hatch figure.
Two quotes can still look far apart after the rows match. That remaining gap is issuer appetite, book costs and the day you clicked — not a reason to invent an average. It is a reason to keep the documents and, if you switch, to put the new policy on risk before you cancel.
Like-for-like does not mean “identical wording”. Issuers use different definitions. It means you have searched the same event in both PDSs and you know where they diverge. A flood definition that does not match is a failed row, even if both tiles said “flood available”. That literacy sits in what is a PDS and in exclusions. Price cannot repair a definition you did not read.
If a path cannot ask a question that would change the price — a young driver, a renovation, a destination, a share-house occupancy — write “incomplete” in that column. Incomplete is not cheap. It is an unfinished sheet.
After you pick a column
Read the schedule the day it arrives. Confirm rows 3–10 in print. Diary cooling-off if the PDS offers it and you have not claimed.
Re-run the sheet at renewal and after a life change — renovation, new driver, new pet diagnosis, new occupation, new destination. Review is not automatically switch.
Keep the sheet with the PDS. If a claim starts, the questions you asked become the file you already have.
Price mechanic
Excess versus premium
A lower premium is often the insurer handing you a larger first-loss. That is rational only if you can fund every stacked excess in cash. Align the excess rows, then compare the premiums you were actually quoted — never a banner number from another year.
- Write the standard, voluntary, age, inexperienced and event excesses for each quote.
- Ask whether more than one can apply on the same claim.
- If you cannot fund the stack, the “saving” is not a saving.
Worked comparison
A like-for-like experiment (no live prices)
Two quotes for the same person, the same object, and the same event. Only one row is allowed to move. We will not invent the invoices — you fill those from quotes you actually received.
Quote A — thicker promise
- Named event is in the “we will pay” chapter
- Excess stack written in full
- Sum insured or benefit period you can defend
- Extras you would actually use
Quote B — thinner invoice
- Same event? If not, stop ranking
- Higher or extra excess you may not fund
- Lower sum, shorter wait, or a missing extra
- Looks cheaper because the promise shrank
If you cannot say which single row changed, you do not have a price comparison. You have two products.
Like-for-like worksheet
Copy this into a notes app. Leave the premium cell empty until every other cell matches across quotes.
| Row | What to write | Quote A | Quote B |
|---|---|---|---|
| Event named | Storm, smash, hospital, vet, rent stop — one sentence | — | — |
| Cover layer | Comprehensive vs TPPD; hospital vs extras; accident vs illness | — | — |
| Listed people / use | Drivers, tenants, occupation, destination | — | — |
| Excess stack | Standard + voluntary + age + event | — | — |
| Limits / valuation | Rebuild, agreed vs market, annual cap, benefit period | — | — |
| Waits & exclusions | Pre-existing, flood, sports, “we will not pay” | — | — |
| Extras ticked | Windscreen, hire car, portable, flood option | — | — |
| Premium you were quoted | Last column — only after the rows above match | — | — |
Like-for-like quote checklist
Tick these before you rank invoices. A missing tick means you are comparing different products.
1.Same event named on both quotes
A cheaper tile that never pays your event is a different product.
2.Same excess stack
Age, inexperienced, event and voluntary excesses can add on the claim day.
3.Same sum insured or benefit period
A lower rebuild figure or a shorter income-protection benefit looks cheaper.
4.Same exclusions and waiting periods
Flood, pre-existing, sports and waiting tables hide in the PDS, not the price.
5.Same listed people and use
Unlisted drivers, business use or a tenanted property change both price and claims.
6.Same extras ticked
Adding hire-car on one quote and not the other breaks the comparison.
Where price hides in the PDS
Search the PDF for “we will not”, “limit”, “excess”, “waiting” and the name of the extra you ticked.
Sub-limits inside a “full” sum insured
Jewellery, bikes, temporary accommodation and similar lines often have their own caps. The headline sum is not the payout for every item.
Optional extras that were never optional on the tile
A quote may include windscreen, portable cover or flood as a default tick. Untick and the price moves — and so does the product.
Waiting periods that buy a cheaper start date
Health, pet and income-protection prices can look lower when the wait is longer. The cheap month is unpaid if the event lands in the wait.
Market value versus agreed or rebuild
A lower valuation basis can lower the premium and the settlement. Line the basis up before you rank the invoices.
Price myths we will not print as facts
Not a method
“The cheapest quote is the cheapest insurance.”
A lower invoice often means a thinner promise, a higher excess stack, or a waiting period that would decline the event you named.
Not a method
“A comparison tile is already like-for-like.”
Tiles freeze a few fields. Excess stacks, extras, flood, and listed people live in the PDS and schedule.
Not a method
“If I did not claim, the renewal cannot rise.”
Book-level costs, rebuild or repair inflation, and a factor on your schedule can move the price without a claim from you.
Not a method
“Bundling always saves money.”
A multi-policy discount can hide a weaker wording. Compare each product as if the discount did not exist.
Questions to take to an issuer
Ask these in writing. A shrug is a reason to keep shopping the document, not the tile.
1.Which event on my one-line brief does this product actually pay?
If the issuer cannot point to a PDS chapter, you are shopping a brand, not cover.
2.Which excesses can apply on the same claim, and can I fund the stack?
The large number on the quote form is rarely the whole first-loss.
3.What is excluded under a different name — flood vs storm, illness vs accident, own vs any occupation?
Definitions, not brochure adjectives, decide the payout.
4.What waiting period starts if I buy this week and the event happens next month?
A cheaper start date can be an unpaid month.
5.If I cancel mid-term or switch, when does the old cover end and the new cover start?
A gap is more expensive than a day of overlap.
6.What would a misrepresentation on this application do to a later claim?
A cheap quote that depends on a guessed answer is not a comparison win.
Related price long-tails
Car
How much does car insurance cost in Australia?
How comprehensive and third-party prices are formed — no invented averages.
Home
How much does home insurance cost in Australia?
Rebuild, flood wording and excess — the rows that move a home premium.
Contents
Contents insurance cost in Australia
Portable limits and apartment contents — not a cheaper building policy.
Health
How much does private health insurance cost?
Hospital versus extras, waiting periods and rebate mechanics in general terms.
Life
Does life insurance cost more with age?
Age, health and benefit design — not a priced table of funds.
Travel
Travel insurance cost for an overseas trip
Destination, sports and medical rules that move a travel premium.
After you finish this page
- 1. Write the event in one sentence.
- 2. Fill the like-for-like worksheet from two real quotes — not from this website.
- 3. Read the PDS chapters you ticked as risks.
- 4. Only then rank the premiums you were given.
Frequently asked questions
What questions should I ask before buying insurance?
What event is covered, who or what is listed, which excesses stack, what is excluded, what waiting period applies, how a claim is evidenced, how the payout is valued, and what happens if you cancel. Then ask for the premium you were quoted for that exact configuration — not a marketing “from” price.
How do I compare two quotes fairly?
Freeze the event and the mechanics. If quote B uses a higher excess, fewer listed people, a market-value payout, or a longer wait, it is not cheaper — it is thinner. Adjust the forms until the rows match, or stop calling the prices comparable.
Can I use this checklist on a comparison website?
Yes. The website does not replace the PDS. Use the same rows on every tile, including any future partner path. On this domain, Compare offers is a stub and not a live ranking.
What does like-for-like mean when comparing insurance quotes?
The same event, people, object, use, layer, excess stack, limits, extras and waiting periods on every path. If a row does not match, you are ranking different products. Only then compare the premiums those configurations produced.
Why do two quotes for the same car look so different?
They usually differ on a factor, not on a mysterious market. Listed drivers, use, valuation, extras or the excess stack moved. Read what affects premiums, freeze the rows, and ask again. A leftover “from” banner is not a second price.
Should I compare premiums before I read the PDS?
No. The PDS and schedule decide whether the event is paid, which excesses stack, and which extras you actually bought. Ranking invoices first is how a thinner product wins. Documents, then mechanics, then the number you were quoted.
Sources and further reading
Keep reading
How to compare insurance prices
Cover first, price second — a repeatable comparison method.
Excess vs premium
Why a lower premium can cost more at claim time — and how excess types stack.
What is a PDS?
How to read a Product Disclosure Statement without drowning in the appendix.
What affects insurance premiums in Australia?
The qualitative drivers issuers commonly use — without a pricing engine.
How to lower insurance premiums legally
Levers that change price without inventing a saving percentage.
How much does car insurance cost in Australia?
How comprehensive and third-party prices are formed — no invented averages.