Blog
Keep Up to Date With First Response Finance
This is where you will find all of the latest finance news relating to First Response Finance, including awards, charities, product announcements and general fun and interesting information.
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First Response Finance Blogs
Most Recent
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Your Guide to Private Number Plates Are you thinking about buying a private number plate registration? Make sure you read our blog so you're up to date with the latest rules and regulations - helping you to avoid a £1,000 fine! |
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Here we take a look at several staycation destinations in the UK, and discuss some of the best driving roads in these locations!
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To continue providing award-winning service to our dealer partners and customers during the lockdown period(s), we needed to improve out IT systems - this is where Node4 came in. |
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Are you interested in knowing what the best-selling vehicles of 2021 are? In this blog, we investigate new and used vehicle sales over the last few years, trends in the industry, and give an insight as to where they may be headed in the future. |
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Check out our top tips on how to reduce the amount of fuel your car, van, or motorbike uses; in turn saving you money! |
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The price increase for energy bills has put a strain on the finances of many households across the UK. However, there are some simple changes that you can make to reduce the amount of energy your home uses; in turn making your gas, electricity, and water bills more affordable. |
Customer Journey Blogs
Real-life stories from our customers about their journey to getting on the road with the help of First Response Finance.
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Find out all about Adrian's journey to getting his new Honda PCX 125 on the road, with the help of First Response Finance! |
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Find out all about Blake's journey to getting his Jaguar XF 3.0 Luxury V6 on the road, with the help of First Response Finance! |
Top Tips Blogs
These blogs are designed to give you tips for driving, looking after vehicles or generally enjoying life within your new motor.
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15 Ways to Keep Driving Costs Down If you've just purchased your first car you may be surprised at how much it could cost on a monthly basis but, not to worry, we've found the top 15 tips to keeping the costs of a used car down. |
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We spoke with our Customer Experience team to find the best advice and tips when it comes to owning and looking after a used car. They've detailed some of the most common issues. |
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Understanding Your Credit File We simplify the basics of credit files in an easy to read blog and easy to watch video. We gathered some of the team at First Response to talk through what credit files are, what credit scores are and what you need to know about them. |
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How to Improve Your Credit File This can be tricky but knowing which factors can affect you will help when it comes to making decisions about finance. Finance companies, whether they are loan companies or mobile phone shops will look at certain factors. |
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A blog dedicated to giving you tips on how you can maintain your credit file once it's in a good place. Read why it's important to keep on top of things as well as how easy it is for it to go backwards unless you're watching it. |
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Top Tips - Purchasing Your Next Vehicle We highlight 10 key tips that you should keep in mind when you're looking at buying or financing your next vehicle. These tips are designed with you in mind to help you get the most out of the motor. |
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How to Avoid Aggressive Driving As part of our Driver Personas month we're looking into one of the most common driving persons on the road: the aggressive driver. Unfortunately, they're everywhere and sometimes unavoidable. |
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How to Have a Relaxing Commute It's been proven that driving in congestion or peak times can be frustrating and far from relaxing. With schools going back this week we thought we'd spread some of our best tips and ways for keeping your cool during your commute to and from work. |
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We look into the world of technology, bots and apps to look at how these can help you save money. If you're no good at having spare cash at the end of the month or need a different way to stop you spending then this is the blog for you. |
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Alternative to Scrapping Vehicles Sometimes the value of a part exchange or scrap value can come as a shock as its lower than you were expecting. Our social media buffs have interesting ways to upcycle or reuse parts of your old vehicle and keep you reminiscing. |
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As UK temperatures plummet, it’s important to remember “to be prepared by making sure your vehicle is in good working condition and add plenty of time for your planned journey so you’re less likely to rush". Back to top |
Finance
Aimed at giving you dedicated information on finance, our products, and how we help our customers.
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At First Response we have been specialising in providing "bad credit" car loans since 1998 and have financed over 130,000 customers with poor credit histories. |
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Why We Only Work With Selected Dealers You may not know, but in order to sell finance products a company must be registered with the FCA, otherwise they’re trading illegally. |
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With our bad credit motorbike finance, who says your credit history need haunt you when you’re after the bike of your dreams? |
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Deadline for PPI Claims First Response stopped selling PPI in 2011, but it's useful to know that if you're concerned about how you were sold PPI by any lender, the deadline for claims to be made is approaching. |
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Your Application... What Happens Next? Whether you've just submitted an application, waiting for a call, or looking for your favourite vehicle, this handy step-by-step blog let's you know what to expect next! |
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On the 15th October the FCA published proposals to outlaw Motor Dealers from receiving commission payments linked to the interest rate that customers pay. Back to top |
Our Community Blogs
These blogs are about First Response Finance and the community we work in, whether that's in the office or externally in the wider community.
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We separate from Magic Breakfast after 5 years. Read which charity will now be our chosen one, why and how we came to decide on this great cause. We're confident that we'll make a big difference through our internal and external events. |
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Last year we partnered with Derby College to give a little bit of extra help to their A Level Business students by giving them real life examples of the work that they have learning in their classes, seminars, and workshops. |
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On a regular basis you’ll find our CEO and HR Manager giving every member of staff the opportunity to give opinions on the business. One item that was mentioned by a few members of staff was that there weren’t enough spaces to relax. |
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Team Building and Social Events We put a lot of time into our staff by ensuring their well being is a priority, one way we do this is by encouraging team building and social events outside of work with a quarterly budget for each staff member. Read why this is important and how teams have spent their budgets. |
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We do a lot of fundraising for our chosen charity SANE as well as our employees chosen charities. We've raised an astonishing amount so far. This blog goes through some of the best ways we've raised money. Back to top |
Our Awards Blogs
These blogs talk through the multiple awards we've won as a company. These are based on customer-facing awards as well as business-focused awards.
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Finance Provider of the Year 2021 We attended the much anticipated award ceremony at Spinnaker Tower to find out whether we had won our nominated award of Finance Provider of the Year. Read the blog to find out if we did! |
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We've been the Number 1 Car Loan Company for almost 4 years! We took the top spot on Review Centre in 2014. At the time of reaching the top spot we had over 450 unique reviews. |
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A round up of our Best Company results over the last few years. Currently we are 24th in the UK, the fifth year in the top 30. Read how we work, how we look after our staff and what our staff love. |
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We've been voted the best car finance company (non-prime). We're very proud to receive this prestigious award as it's voted for by UK dealers. |
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We are the best car finance provider within the UK. Read why we're the best and what you should compare if looking at other companies. Back to top |
Fun Blogs
Lighthearted and fun - the type of blogs you'll love to share with your friends.
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A part of our Driver Personas month we investigate the differences between car colours and what they usually mean about the driver. We look at the most popular colours to drive and those which are no longer that common. |
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What Your Car Choice Says About You BMW drivers are aggressive right? Nissan drivers are happy tootling along? We've conducted some research into the most popular driving styles and their associated vehicle to find out if these stereotypes are right. |
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Unfortunately there are several things you should consider when looking for a new vehicle as they could increase your insurance. Not all cars are equal in the eyes of an insurer and neither are job titles or your accommodation type. Back to top |
Dealer Information Blogs
Blogs wrote with our dealer partners in mind. These are here to inform dealers of updates or need-to-know details about our exhibitions and ways in which we can help to assist your dealership.
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The place to check out all of the improvements we make to our website, the dealer portal, commissions or First Response in general. |
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Dealer Portal - 'How to' Guides We have a great dealer portal that has been built with the dealers usability at the forefront of our developments, find out how to use it here. |
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Our assistance with promotional material and advice to improve deals using finance is something many of our dealers have benefited from. |
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The place to check out all of the First Response Finance dealer portal how-to videos. |
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A quick and easy guide to get your business performing on social media. Back to top |
Industry Blogs
News from the automotive and finance industry.
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30% of Drivers Would Fail Their Test We recently ran a survey of 1,000 UK drivers to find out exactly what their knowledge is about different parts under the bonnet. How many knew how to check the oil, coolant, or brake fluid? |
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With driverless taxis being tested in Singapore and Google pumping more money into their research into driverless cars, we examine if it really is the future. What's next? Will it succeed? Read the blog to learn more. |
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Pros and Cons of Electric Cars We look into the true costs of an electric car taking into consideration government grants and help that's available. We used average costs to calculate if it's really worth splashing out on an electric car or to simply stick with what you've got. |
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Sometimes we can blindly follow technology without ever stopping to think about how they actually work. We were curious about the magic of Sat Navs so did some investigating about how they get us from A to B. |
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Rules in F1 are more complex than they ever have been before. As the dust settles on the British Grand Prix and the confetti is cleared away after Lewis Hamilton’s victory, we thought we’d take a closer look under the bonnet. |
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Is Finance Cheaper than Train Travel? At the start of this year the rail networks made their annual price increases taking the overall price increase to 25% in 5 years. We found the stats to be interesting and thought we'd do some investigation to see how the prices compared with driving. |
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It's a status you'll read on a number of dealer's websites and even on car comparison sites but do you understand what it means? We've simplified the terms 'HPI check' and 'HPI clear' so you can find out if it's something you need to be worried about. |
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The Rise of Dash Cams in the UK More and more people are using dashboard cameras in order to monitor their driving and the driving of others around them. We didn't know much about them so spent some time investigating exactly why they've become popular and why you might consider buying one. |
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Who’s better at driving, men or women? No doubt this question has caused a few arguments and heated debates in the past as men claim their parking’s top notch and women claim to be more careful on the road. Well, statistically. |