hi folks just to let you know my mate had a puncture saturday and although he has full RAC break down cover they wanted £80 call out and 85p per mile to come out to a puncture as they dont see a punture as a break down. so check with them if you are a member. good luck happy riding bernie                                                                                                                                                                             

rac? no problem for me.....came out inside 35 minutes to pick up tiger near motorway and took tiger to shipley,origional time estimate 2-3 hours...loan bike bonneville from shipley ended up with screw in back tyre..there inside 30 mins,would not repair as too close to sidewall(my opinion too),rang up and authorized pick up and delivered back to shipley,both guys top blokes ,bikers themselves.potential disaster filled week made good by these blokes...

I would say a puncture is not a brakedown so could be down to who picks up the phone                                                                                                                                                                              

last time i had a puncture the recovery service would only recover me up to 20 miles free, rather than to home. Fortunately I was within that distance of a friends house and had the bike taken there.. I think they have the same policy on cars if you dont carry a spare wheel, unless the car is not designed to take a spare wheel (like mine!) in which case they cover it as a normal.. 

  Bleddy nora! what other 'excuses' are they going to use to avoid paying out/acting in our interests?   No wonder loads don't bother paying insurance/breakdown.                                                                                                                                                                               

this is ridiculous. a puncture is'nt a brakedown in a car - unless your disabled but it certainly is on a bike. what the hell are they playing at. we should all stay clear of that lot. try green flag, they're a lot cheaper                                                                                                                                                                             

been with the rac for years, never had a problem. they don't fix punctures anymore but pick me up, usualy on a dirty great car transporter and take me wherever i want to go.                                                                                                                                                                               

rac policy appears to be tubeless repairs okay but with plenty of warning about dont go blasting along and get it pro. repaired asap,otherwise will transport bike and rider.....just remember,only reason i'm with rac is aa scrapped all their trailers/bike orientated patrols 10-15 years ago so i cancelled my membership then. 

I think its just bad preperation you dont all have a spare you can just whip out your pocket!!!                                                                                                                                                                              

omnf,quite happy to do tubed type wheels by the side of the road,as long as i remembered to pack tyre levers,repair kit ,spanners to do job.                                                                                                                                                                             

up date have spoken to rac and they will take the bike for 10 miles to get fixed after that up tp £2 per mile un less u have there foreward jurney cover                                                                                                                                                                              

We changed from Green Flag to RAC about 10 years following a series of punctures when we were in Belgium.

First puncture just outside Brussels, rang Green Flag who said Belgium was like France and we'd have to ring for recovery using roadside phone. Eventually a bloke in a little van turned up, tutted and called a recovery vehicle, costing us a fortune, which took us to a Honda dealers. Great, get new tyre we thought, no, they made the hole bigger and stuck some gunky rope stuff in and sent us on our way. 

20 miles down the road, flat tyre again, rang Green Flag again, were told no, Belgium is not like France, don't have to rely on the motorway breakdown, sent someone else out to recover and repair us.  Taken down a lot of back streets, to a very small garage in a dodgy area, wondered if we'd be found at the side of the road, with the bike, luggage and money gone.  Fortunately, they put some more of the gunky rope stuff in and sent us on our way again. 

Yep, you guessed it, tyre went flat again. Rang Green Flag again, and wow a breakdown van turned up in about 10 minutes. Nope, not Green Flag, the Belgium equivalent of the RAC! Many phone calls and negotiations later, tyre was repaired again with a double dose of gunky rope (apparently you need the double dose).  The repairman said Green Flag were bad payers and recomended RAC when abroad. (In a later breakdown, RAC were superb).

When we got back to England, Green Flag tried to wash their hands of us but we refused to ride home from Dover with a repaired tyre as it was illegal.  Eventually they put us up in a travelodge (4am in the morning!), and took us later that morning to a bike dealer who replaced the tyre.  Driver suggested that we let Green Flag invoice us for the cost of the tyre. Good advice. 

Got home, almost 24 hours later than we should have done and completely shattered, still its character building! 

After a lot of arguing, we had a full refund of the money it had cost us in Belgium, plus lots of £10s because they didn't get to us within 30 minutes or whatever it was and they didn't charge for the tyre. Reckon that was because I used to work for Green Flag and knew who at the top to send the complaints to. 

After that, it was RAC all the way for us. 

At the end of the day, most breakdown companies are pretty much the same, like insurance companies.                                                                                                                                                                               

broke down in my empty FORD TRANSIT last year rac would'nt touch it, erm it was to big......................................