Liability on a cancelled credit card

jainpankaj

Hi

I have recently purchased a car insurance with Aviva online. There was a small print for auto renewal of the car insurance on subsequent year and I though I could cancel it. Now it appears that I can only cancle it once I get the renewal notice, which will be sent only a month before the current policy expires. I am now stuck with a situation where I will be forced to wait for 11 months before I can talk to their customer services to cancel the automatic renewal.

I have been with them for 5 years for both both cars and never faced such situation. Therir renewal quote is always expensive than their online quote and hence I always ignore their renewal quote, go online and their renewal quote is beaten by atleast £25 with a couple of clicks.

I am looking for options to avoid such situation. One temptation is to report the credit card lost and then the credit card company will issue a new number. The other option I can think of is to cancel my credit card all together. But I am not sure either of the two option will be good enough to stop Aviva from taking money from my card next year, incase I forget to cancel my policy.

Is there any option to force Aviva to cancel the automatic renewal on my policy now. Surely this is a dirty trick by them to trap customers who ignores the renewal notice and sign new contracts. Surely the onus shall be on Aviva to confirm whether or not I want to continue with their renewal quote.

benf90

Cancelling and/or reporting the card as lost won't make any difference, they'll still be able to take payment.

It seems a bit strange they can't cancel the auto renewal and/or just change the card details.

Have you tried making an official complaint with them?

jainpankaj

benf90 wrote: »

Cancelling and/or reporting the card as lost won't make any difference, they'll still be able to take payment.

It seems a bit strange they can't cancel the auto renewal and/or just change the card details.

Have you tried making an official complaint with them?

Thanks a lot for the reply. I had a feeling that they would be able to take payments from a cancelled credit card. Its a pity that there is no safeguard for credit card holders against such an unfair marketing tactics.

Looks like I have to write an official complaint to them.

Its strange that I bought two motor insurance policies with Aviva yesterday, one directly from them and one through RAC. The policy through the RAC was at £160 where as Aviava'a online quote for the same car was £185 online. I could cancel the auto renewal on the policy bought through RAC (Aviva the underlying insurer) but not on the policy bought directly from Aviva.

ylesia

benf90 wrote: »

Cancelling and/or reporting the card as lost won't make any difference, they'll still be able to take payment.

I don't think is always the case. For example I set up my son with a Club Penguin membership and accidently used a credit card that was about to expire in a couple of months. 3 months later my son informed me that he wasn't a member anymore, I called up their customer service (as I didn't know what the problem was as hadn't realised the card expired) and they said that they could not take payment from the card as it was expired so the membership was automatically cancelled (I had a new card by this point for the same credit card account).

Maybe it's different for cards that expire rather than cancelled?

benf90

I've never bought directly through Aviva but it does seem a bit strange as you say. I've been able to cancel the auto renewal with other companies.

I hope you went through a cash back site by the way, it's £70 cash back for RAC Car insurance policies

http://www.topcashback.co.uk/retailerdetailRAC_Car_Insurance.htm

http://www.quidco.com/rac/

benf90

ylesia wrote: »

Maybe it's different for cards that expire rather than cancelled?

Sounds like they were possibly taking a manual payment each time rather than it being a CPA (continuous payment authority).

In general though they will still go through. If a company takes payment under a CPA on an old card the it will usually just automatically transfer over to the new card.

If it doesn't happen automatically the credit card company will go into the old account, apply a credit and then transfer over the debit amount to the new card.

lisyloo

Its a pity that there is no safeguard for credit card holders against such an unfair marketing tactics.

My advice is NEVER use continuous card authority.
Use direct debit where you have legal rights or send them a cheque.

jainpankaj

benf90 wrote: »

Sounds like they were possibly taking a manual payment each time rather than it being a CPA (continuous payment authority).

In general though they will still go through. If a company takes payment under a CPA on an old card the it will usually just automatically transfer over to the new card.

If it doesn't happen automatically the credit card company will go into the old account, apply a credit and then transfer over the debit amount to the new card.

How do I know whether Aviva has set up a CPA or not? Can I check this with my credit card company and have them cancelled?

jainpankaj

lisyloo wrote: »

My advice is NEVER use continuous card authority.
Use direct debit where you have legal rights or send them a cheque.

I don't think I tried to setup a CPA (didn't even known the existence of CPA at the point of purchase). The only option was to use the credit card. But surely I shall have the option to cancel CPA.

jainpankaj

benf90 wrote: »

I hope you went through a cash back site by the way, it's £70 cash back for RAC Car insurance policies

Yes I bought both my policy through topcashback (one directly through aviav other through RAC) £70 *2 tracked within 12 hrs. Hope I eventually get the cash back

lisyloo

Are you seriously saying the only option was to use a credit card?
If that happens again then don't deal with that company, it's really fishy.

No you do not have the option to unilaterally cancel a CPA but you DO with a direct debit.
This is why you are strongly advised not to use CPA (walk away and find another company if necessary).
You can cancel a CPA with the retailer directly, but of course they have to agree and not "lose" your correspondance.

If the only way a company will deal with you is through CPA then my advice is to walk away and find an insurer that does direct debit.
This is almost all of them so there is something seriously fishy with a company that insists you use CPA.