Privacy Guard - Another CRA?

pardal51

Hi all,

received in today's post a letter from lloyds TSB selling a year subscription of PrivacyGuard - to get a Credit report. Is this a new CRA? or a company under the TSB umbrella?

price: £6.99/month; with the usual 30-day free trial, which I am tempted to accept.

Any thoughts???

tattooed_lady

I had this come through when I got my Tesco CC. It is infact just a subscription with Experian (they charge £49.99 for a year) so I wouldn't bother with Privacy Guard. You can get a month free with Experian if you want and (if you should wish to) you can subscribe for the year and it's cheaper than Privacy Guard. As far as I could tell there was no greater benefit by signing up for their service.

sicker

If it were of any use it would be well noted here and you would be initiating the correspndance, not them. Just another sales pitch in my opinion.

John.

Sooler

Got one today with a Debenhams logo, free for 30 days then £69.99 a year

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Trying to make out it's from Debenhams, what a load of rubbish, makes Debenhams look a bunch of shysters.

CreditExpert offers you a FREE Experian credit report via Quidco - and you get paid £6

James

Threre are two other means of protecting yourself from ID Theft for next to nothing.

The first is to put a total FREEZE on your credit files.

Already legally available in most US States. (Details here). But you can do it in the UK without legislation FREE (apart from the cost of 3 stamps, envelopes and letters). You use the very same concept as those usingwww.freeidprotection.co.uk . Write to the 3 Credit Reference Agencies, use the Notice of Correction Facility, and put a FREEZE on your File for Applications.

The only drawback with Freezing Your Files is trying to remove the Freeze.

The only drawback with www.freeidprotection.co.uk is that as ALL applications in your name require manual processing, applications for credit cards, loans etc may take a little longer to process. A small price to pay for added security and something the Finance Industry could easily address.

tuppennychef

I keep on getting letters to join Privacyguard, the latest one was from Asda. Why are these companies sending out these letters. I know we are supposed to read the small print on everything but alot of older people might not and end up getting caught in this trap of thinking they are receiving a free report when in actual fact they are signing up to spend £69.99 a year.

Sooler

tuppennychef wrote: »

I keep on getting letters to join Privacyguard, the latest one was from Asda. Why are these companies sending out these letters.

I think if you look closely it’s not from Asda, it’s from PrivacyGuard – they just stick different stores logos at the top trying to fool you into thinking it’s endorsed by that store.

rosesrecords

My partner has just fallen for this scam,thinking that the form,which appeared to have been sent by Asda Credit Card was for a free credit cheque.She has just spent the morning trying to get the £69.99 deducted from her Asda Credit card,and after ringing Asda,was told to ring Privacy Guard,who refused to refund the money.Asda have denied responsibility,and even rang us back to further state that they could not help.What is our next port of call? Can anyone help with this,as we do not intend to pay the £69.99 which we feel was fraudulently obtained.

sophsix

I signed up for free trial as encouraged by debenhams headed letter paper in jan and thought nothing of it. Got charged £69.99 today...debenhams said not their problem and privacyguard said it was all clear in the information pack...found it in small print 2/3rds of the page down. Feel duped as you normally get a warning when a free period is due to finish and am also furious that debenhams gave my permission to take funds from my credit card...can they do that??? please please can someone tell me how to get out of this? £70 is alot of money to me and i just feel the information sent was deliberately misleading.

DifferentFromTheNorm

sophsix wrote: »

I signed up for free trial as encouraged by debenhams headed letter paper in jan and thought nothing of it. Got charged £69.99 today...debenhams said not their problem and privacyguard said it was all clear in the information pack...found it in small print 2/3rds of the page down. Feel duped as you normally get a warning when a free period is due to finish and am also furious that debenhams gave my permission to take funds from my credit card...can they do that??? please please can someone tell me how to get out of this? £70 is alot of money to me and i just feel the information sent was deliberately misleading.

It's how they make money, offering the free trial and hoping people forget to cancel.

Unfortunately, as you say yourself, the information is there with what you got sent. It's up to you to read it, if you didn't then on this occasion it's turned out to be an expensive mistake.

I'm not sure why you're furious at Debenhams for allowing the payment. You gave them permission when you signed up for the service. They sent the paperwork to you so they can only presume that you read it.

When speaking to PrivacyGuard did you make it clear that you wanted it to be cancelled? Don't forget that you're now signed up to an annual policy, so they'll be charging you again next year unless you tell them not to!

Make sure they cancel it, it may be best to send a recorded letter to them also so that if they take payment next year you can prove that you cancelled it.

I'm not sure if you can get out of it so sorry that I can't help with that, but definately make sure you don't get the same charge next year.

konnor83

Hi, don't know if your aware of this now but Privacy Guard now refund all asda customers - apparently asda don't want the hassle or any complaints going back to them. phone them up and they will refund you.