Home Insurance Direct Debit Fee

[dangermou5e]

Hi,

This is my first time writing in ay forum so please forgive me if etiquette has not been followed!

I pay for my home & contents insurance via monthly Direct Debit. I'm happy with what I'm paying and the service I'm getting. However, I recently renewed my policy and found an extra payment of £15 has gone to my insurance provider.

I must state at this point that the few first lines of my renewal letter said something along the lines of "... if you're renewing your existing policy you don't need to do anything else...", so I didn't. After reading that I stopped reading and filed the letter.

After phoning them this morning about the extra £15 debit they told me that it is because I never signed and returned the new credit agreement. I argued that they didn't need it signed because they have started to take my new payments anyway and that the renewal letter said that I didn't need to do anything more. They countered with something to do with a regulatory requirement of having a signed agreement. I came back with the same arguement and we went round in circles for a bit.

Anyway, it ended in stalemate between myself and the customer service rep so I thought I would ask on here if anyone knows if this fee for not signing and returning a credit agreement is legit?

Thanks for you help.

[Quentin]

See if this is mentioned in any ts + cs you agreed, and if not dispute the charge.

[dunstonh]

If you refused to sign and return the credit agreement then they are taking on an increased risk and it is logical that they would want to charge you more for it (or cancel your insurance as that would be even more logical).

I havent actually seen a company charge like that before but new way that the credit agreements are now handled on monthly payments would make a charge logical.

[InsideInsurance]

What does the rest of the letter actually say? Does it mention about signing a new credit agreement or not?