Everyone would like to have a lower car insurance premium. The cost of car insurance tends to rise year after year. Although the cost largely depends on your car, your age and no claim bonus discount, there are a few steps you can take to help stop the rise or even reduce your premium.

1. Buy from the internet
Most companies offer a discount for online applications as this is automated process and costs them a lot less to process your application, you can usually see discounts of 5%-10%.

2. Shop around
All insurance companies use different formulas to calculate your insurance premium by adding or detracting money after each question the ask you. By shopping around you could find big savings on your insurance premium.

3. Buy extra products
Most insurance companies also do other insurance products eg home and contents insurance. Most insurance companies will give extra discounts for purchasing more than one product and by doing this you could save a fair amount on all your insurance premiums.

4. Pay your insurance premium in one go
By paying your insurance premium in full you can avoid paying costly interest charges that would be added if you paid your insurance premium by instalments. You may even receive a discount for paying in full.

5. Increase your voluntary excess
Your excess is the amount paid by you in the event of a claim and by increasing this amount your insurance company should reduce your premium.

6. Have an alarm or immobiliser fitted
Theft of and from your vehicle plays a major role in the calculation of your insurance premium. Having an alarm or immobiliser fitted will give you a small discount to your premium.

7. Insure your car for third party damage only
Third party is the minimum cover you are required to have by law. It is also the cheapest. If your vehicle is of a low value then you could consider this type of cover. You need to remember that with this type of cover if you were to have a accident that any damage to your vehicle would not be covered for repair.

8. Remove any unnecessary drivers from the policy
If you have a young driver on your insurance policy that no longer uses the vehicle you should remove them as this will reduce your premium. Some insurance companies will reduce the premium for a young driver if they have an older named driver on the insurance.

Additional drivers on your policy usually mean a higher premium. A lot of people add a number of extra drivers on the policy just in case that person needs to drive the car. However, having all these drivers will push up the cost. By only naming drivers on the policy that will definitely driver the car, you can lower the final cost.

9. Build up and protect your no-claim bonus
One of the biggest factors affecting your car insurance premium is the number of years without a claim. You could receive up to 75% discount for around 5 years without a claim. The more years you can stay claim free the safer driver your insurance company will see you as. Some companies give you the option of paying a bit more on your premium to protect your no claim bonus. This may be worth considering as even a small claim may increase your premium by up to 75%.

10. Join a car club
If your vehicle is classic or specialist consider joining a club related to your car. Most clubs offer insurance schemes that have very good premium rates.