I renewed throught the comparison sites and came up with Swiftcover, i messed about a little with the information and discovered that having a woman on your policy reduces it by 15-20% (i put my mother on there!), adding commuting and business miles added about £3, putting the mileage at 6000 per year always got the cheapest quote.
However they also want the exactly how it left the factory and anything added or taken away from the standard specification has to be delcared, non standard alloys add £160, Towbar add £60 etc. etc. No claims makes a difference of about 25-35% going from 2 years to 9 years (discovered i could use my bike no-claims as i'm not currently using it).
They are absolutely taking the **** but what else can you do?