I was picking up a courtesy car from the dealership while they work on my car. Instead of the service manager I was supposed to see, I was met by another and was asked for my National Insurance Number and whether I had any points on my licence. I have never encountered this in all my years renting or having courtesy cars. Long story short, I didn't remember the NIN and this manager indicated that was the deal breaker. I asked to see the manager I was meant to see in the first place, suddenly they didn't need either of those things and just had me sign the usual insurance document, and that was that. While I was waiting for the second manager to come out I called my wife to look up my NIN, so I then offered it twice to the second manager, which he completely brushed off.
I've since mentioned it to a few people and they have never come across this, but I am really curious whether this was normal and they just decided to waive it because I was being difficult, or whether that manager got some wires crossed. I just can't quite figure out what they would need the NIN for. BTW, this is a major main dealer.