To make full use of the features and services we offer, your computer, tablet or mobile phone will need to accept cookies, as we can only provide you with certain features of this website by using them. By using the website you agree to our use of cookies as described in our cookie policy.
What are cookies?
When you use our website, we may store some information on your computer in the form of a helpful file known as a “cookie”. Cookies are used to improve the online experience of almost every website, including our own.
Types of Cookie
When you use our website, there are four types of cookies that may be set on your device. Here we explain what these are and why we use them.
Cookies used on this website
We set some cookies directly, and we also make use of some services which set their own cookies. We believe it is important to be clear about any cookies that are being set, so we have provided a list to explain this to you.
Managing cookies
Most internet browsers allow you to erase cookies from your computer hard drive, block all cookies (or just third-party cookies) or warn you before a cookie is stored on your device.
Cookie FAQs
We’ve put together a list of some of the most common questions about cookies here – but if you’re in any doubt, you can contact us and we’ll do our very best to help. Our office hours are 09:00 to 17:00 Monday to Friday, excluding Bank Holidays. We aim to reply to your query within two working days.
What Are Cookies?
Cookies are small text files which are downloaded to your computer, tablet or mobile phone when you visit a website or application. The website or application may retrieve these cookies from your web browser (eg Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome) each time you visit, so they can recognise you, remember your preferences and provide you with a more secure online experience.
Generally, cookies are very useful and are a common method used by almost every website you visit because they help to make your online experience as smooth as possible. For security reasons, many websites will not function at all without the use of cookies (or other similar technologies, such as “web beacons” or “tags”).
Cookies generally do not hold any information to identify an individual person but are instead used to identify a browser on an individual machine.
Cookies can be referred to as session cookies or persistent cookies, depending on how long they are used:
- Session cookies only last for your online session and disappear from your computer or device when you close your browser.
- Persistent cookies stay on your computer or device after the browser has been closed and last for the period of time specified in the cookie. These persistent cookies may be checked each time you visit the site where the cookie was generated or, in the case of third-party cookies, from another site that also uses the same service.
If you would like to find out more about cookies, you can visit All About Cookies.
Most internet browsers allow you to erase cookies from your computer hard drive, block all cookies (or just third-party cookies) or warn you before a cookie is stored on your device.
Web beacons
Web beacons are a similar technology to cookies; and just like cookies, they can help to deliver an improved online experience. Essentially, they are a clear picture file that is used to keep track of a customer’s navigation through a website or series of websites.
They may also be referred to as “tags”, and are normally used by websites that use third-party traffic monitoring and tracking services, such as web analytics. Web beacons can be used in combination with cookies to gain an understanding of how a website’s users navigate through the site.
If you would like to find out more about web beacons, you can visit All About Cookies.
Types of Cookie
When you use our website, the following four types of cookies may be set on your device:
Necessary cookies
These cookies are essential in helping you to make use of the features and services we offer on the website. Without these cookies, the services you want to use (such as getting an insurance quote) cannot be provided. These cookies do not gather information about you that could be used to identify you, and they do not monitor or remember where you have been on the internet.
Functional cookies
These cookies allow us to provide you with a better online experience when you use our website. They do not gather or store any information which would allow us to identify you personally.
Performance cookies
Performance cookies help us to understand how our customers use our site, so we can keep our products and services relevant, easy to use and up to date. For example, we can see which products and services are most popular, identify when and where errors occur, and test different versions of a page in order to provide an improved online experience. Sometimes, the services we use to collect this information may be operated by other companies on our behalf. They may use similar technologies to cookies, known as “web beacons” or “tags”. These are anonymous and, as they are only used for statistical purposes, they do not contain or collect any information that identifies you.
Targeting cookies
We have relationships with carefully selected and monitored suppliers (third parties) who may also set cookies during your visit. The purpose of these cookies is “behavioural advertising” (also known as “behavioural targeting” or “remarketing”), which is a means of showing you relevant products and services based on what you appear to be interested in. Although these cookies can track your visits around the web they don’t know who you are. Without these cookies, online advertisements you encounter will be less relevant to you and your interests.
The IAB (Internet Advertising Bureau) has put together a great resource for information on behavioural advertising: how it works, further information about cookies, and steps you can take to protect your privacy on the internet.
Cookies Used on This Website
To make full use of the features and services we offer, your computer, tablet or mobile phone will need to accept cookies, as we can only provide you with certain features of this website by using them. These features include the personalisation of the customer journey for returning customers as well as the provision of certain personalised or targeted offers via the website and email. Although we only set a few cookies directly, we also make use of some services which set their own cookies. We believe it is important to be clear about any cookies that are being set, and why, so we have provided the tables below to explain this to you. You will not necessarily see all of the cookies referenced below stored on your machine after visiting our site. Some will depend on how you got here and the features and products that you looked at during your visit. Although we audit the types of cookies that are used on our site, it is possible that the services we use may make changes to their cookie names and purposes. Some services, particularly social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, change their cookies regularly. Although we always aim to show you up-to-date information, we may not be able to reflect these changes in our policy straight away.
Cookies:
These are cookies set by us and are often referred to as first-party cookies.
| Name | Type | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| ASP.NET_SessionId | Necessary | This cookie is essential for our website to function and for your online experience. This cookie is deleted when you close your browser. |
Third-party cookies:
These are cookies set by other services we use as part of our online experience:
| Cookie | Name | Type | Purpose | More information |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| _cls_s | _cls_s | 1st party session-expiry cookie | The session identifying cookie for Glassbox. It also indicates if the visitor is new or existing | |
| _cls_v | _cls_v | 3rd party session cookie | The visitor identifying cookie for Glassbox |
Fraud prevention
Our website also uses both first and third-party cookies as a security measure to protect against fraud and abuse and to help identify irregularities in behaviour, these may include cookies written with Flash technology. You can manage Flash cookies on a per-site basis using the Settings Manager for Adobe Flash Player.† Although we don’t recommend taking such action, this tool enables you to disable the use of Flash cookies or limit activity to specific domains. You can access the tool by right-clicking on any Flash content displayed on your browser and selecting ‘Settings’ or ‘Global Settings’ from the drop-down menu.
Managing Cookies
Most internet browsers allow you to erase cookies from your computer hard drive, block all cookies (or just third-party cookies) or warn you before a cookie is stored.
Please note, that if you choose to block all cookies, our site will not function as intended and you will not be able to use or access many of the services we provide. If you have blocked all cookies and wish to make full use of the features and services we offer, you will need to enable your cookies.
Rather than blocking all cookies, you can choose to only block third-party cookies which will still allow our website to function as intended.
You can find out more about managing cookies by visiting All About Cookies.
Behavioural advertising
We have relationships with carefully selected and monitored suppliers who may also set cookies during your visit. The purpose of these cookies is “behavioural advertising” (also known as “remarketing”), which is a means of showing you relevant products and services based on what you appear to be interested in. If you’d like to opt out of behavioural advertising, please go to the Network Advertising Initiative website.