Reclaiming PPI from A&L and EGG

poplet

After reading numerous posts on many people successfully reclaiming PPI policies that were missold to them, I have a few questions of my own before I take the plunge and reclaim myself, so any opinions on this would be greatly appreciated. I have read the guide to reclaim etc and some of those reasons apply to me. Apologies for this being such a long winded post so please bear with me…

In Jan 2005 I took out a loan with Alliance and Leicester over the telephone (6.5k for a term of 3 years). I was made to believe that in order to have the required loan amount PPI was required; so at no point was I made aware this was optional - as I was desperate to consolidate my existing debts at the time, I took the loan out. I eventually settled the outstanding amount in September 2006 (much earlier than the original term of the loan; and this was with a new loan through Egg - more about this later). I still have all the paperwork from Alliance and Leicester and have spent the evening reading it all; I’m a little confused as I think I may have paid two forms of PPI without knowing until now!? Is this common? What I mean is that the paperwork I have regarding the PPI covered and I quote “accident, sickness, unemployment and death” which was £26.46 a month. A few months after the loan started I received more paperwork from A&L being pleased that I “wisely chosen to protect [my] loan repayments with [their] payment protection plan; [but have I considered] however protecting myself against the other financial consequences of an accident?” and then they go on with “the loan payment protection plan protects the payments on your loan, but how would you pay all your other bills if your income was reduced because you were seriously injured in an accident? “ and this personal accident plan as they call it, is underwritten and administered by Sterling Insurance. They included an acceptance form stating that “valuable protection cannot begin until the acceptance form was received so complete the direct debit instruction, sign it and send it off“. What’s more in big bold letters “important - this acceptance must be received before 31/02/2005“. I think I got mixed up at the time, and perhaps thought this was also part of the PPI, so I sent it off (made a photocopy hence why I can quote what it says). Anyway this was £6.99 a month. After I paid off the loan in Sept 2006, I didn’t realise I was still paying the Sterling insurance until Feb 2007 - which I wrote to them and cancelled.

I guess my questions here are, can I reclaim on both of these? And if so, would I have to write to both these companies or just A&L? Surely if the A&L PPI stated cover for accidents, why would I need additional cover for accidents with Sterling Insurance? I also read on the FSA website that A&L was fined for mis-selling PPI from Jan 2005 - and that’s when I took my loan out!

Moving on to my Egg loan for 10k I took this out in Sept 2006 over the phone for a term of 6 years - again took out PPI as I was scared they wouldn’t give me the loan - was not told PPI was optional so paid £54 a month of PPI. I actually settled this early in full in April 2008 - didn’t take out another loan, paid it off - thanks to my bf!. Anyway I have read that some people have been successful claiming back from Egg, and some havent been so successful. They apparently record every phone conversation and have sent people who are reclaiming their recordings? To be doubly sure, before I try to reclaim, can I request to have the cd of my telephone conversation under the data protection act ? Or shall I not bother with asking for a copy of the phone recording and just send the template letter, and go from there? I also have a credit card with them with an outstanding balance of £300, and I guess I am a little worried that if they are willing to refund me for missold PPI they will demand I pay the £300 back (fine by me); close account (fine by me) and more importantly put a black mark on my credit report? I am really worried about this as I am in the process of buying a house, and obviously don’t want a black mark or anything adverse on my credit rating!
Thanks in advance for any advice / opinions on this.