PPI Halfway there?!?

ICTAndy

First time posting on this site, have been reading through the forums looking for sum relevent help on my current situation on reclaiming PPI insurance but there are so many posts and different situations im a little confused on where to go next.

I followed the article on mis-sold PPI and realised i fell into some of these these categories. I sent off a letter based on the stage 1 template i found in the article and received a reply with an offer back, as a gesture of goodwill but accepting no liability so my problem lies in whether to continue(as i feel the offer isnt good enough) and run the risk of losing any offer at all. This is my current situation:

Bank Loan with PPI - RBS
Total Amount Payable - £38,695.68
Total Loan Amount - £30,614.00
PPI - £6,414.00
PPI Interest - £1,693.92
Loan Period - 72 months from 01/08/2007

The points in which we felt we were mis-sold PPI insurance are as follows -
• The member of staff did not ask you about your previous medical conditions.
• The salesperson was very pushy in selling you the policy so you felt you could not say no.
• The salesperson did not give you the full information on what the policy would and would not cover, for example that the loan only applies to twelve months maximum.
• Having recently looked at the paperwork you have noticed that only William Ferguson is fully covered by the policy and Pauline Ferguson is not covered at all, when you were led to believe that all parties were equally entitled to the insurance cover.

So i sent off this letter with these relevant arguments and roughly 5 weeks later we received a letter back from RBS. The letter included an offer of £750 as a goodwill gesture but with no admittance of liability. I feel the offer isnt really good enough but im not sure whether the Banks reply is standard or not, whether we should reply and try to get more back, i did sum calculations and i think we should be due around £3,100 without the 8% on top(£3,400) for the 28 months @ £112 pm......Here are the points RBS sent back to us -

During the course of my investigation, I looked at all the available evidence that is relevant to your complaint. The following items or documents were reviewed as part of my investigation:

• Loan Agreement Form
• Application Form
• Certificate of Insurance

I would be happy to supply you with a further copy of any of these documents if you wish

Loan Agreement Form

This legal document was completed as a formal record of the loan that was agreed. When you signed it, you specifically confirmed that you required payment protection insurance. The form also detailed the following:

• The payment protection insurance premium payable (i.e. the amount that you were paying for it);
• That the insurance was purchased in a single payment, with the premium being added to the loan;
• The level of interest due on the loan and premium;
• The monthly repayments on the loan, which included the payment protection insurance premium.

In particular it stated:

“I/we wish to purchase optional Loanguard Insurance...”

You signed this form on 01 August 2007.

Application Form

You signed this on 01 August 2007 to confirm that you wished to apply for the payment protection insurance policy. In particular it stated:

“I have read and understood the key features of Loan guard detailed in the Policy Summary. I am the first named borrower on the agreement...”

In relation to your specific complaint points please see my responses below:

The member of staff did not ask you about your previous medical conditions.

The policy was provided on a ‘non-advice’ basis. This means that no recommendation was made as to whether it was suitable for you. Full information about the policy was given which allowed you to decide for yourself whether it was right for your needs both now and in the future.

As the policy was provided on an on-advised basis, the salesperson was not required to assess any existing medical conditions you may have had. You were provided with full policy terms and conditions in the Certificate of Insurance to decide for yourself whether the cover was suitable for your needs. I am pleased to confirm that pre-existing medical conditions are not excluded from this policy so, subject to meeting all relevant conditions, you are able to make a claim for such conditions

• The salesperson was very pushy in selling you the policy so you felt you could not say no.

Our staff are trained to ensure that all customers understand that the policy is optional, that declining cover will in no way affect their application for a loan and that the loan and insurance policy are separate products and separate transactions. This information forms an essential part of our sales process.

There is no evidence that you were incorrectly told that you must take the policy to be successful in your application for the loan. Again, the above documents made it clear the policy was optional and your loan application would be assessed in exactly the same way regardless of whether or not you decided to take the insurance.

• The salesperson did not give you the full information on what the policy would and would not cover, for example that the loan only applies to twelve months maximum.

Full details of the key benefits, features and significant limitations and exclusions of the policy were provided in the Certificate of Insurance and Loan Agreement This made the key elements of cover clear. No advice was provided by our staff on whether or not you should take the policy. Instead, they simply provided you with full information on it so that you could decide for yourself whether you wished to proceed with it.

• Having recently looked at the paperwork you have noticed that only William Ferguson is fully covered by the policy and Pauline Ferguson is not covered at all, when you were led to believe that all parties were equally entitled to the insurance cover.

The Certificate of Insurance clearly stated under the eligibility section:

“On the commencement date you must. . .be named on the loan agreement. Only the first named applicant can be insured on this agreement.”

The Loanguard application you signed on 01 August 2007 stated:

“I am the first named borrower on the agreement...”

All of the information provided was in the name of William Ferguson which made it clear that the policy was in their sole name.

The policy also came with a cancellation period. This means that if you were unhappy with it or felt in anyway pressured into applying for the policy, you did have the opportunity of exercising this option after you met/spoke to the member of staff

Decision

The details of the policy were confirmed in the above documents. The optional nature of the insurance and full details of the eligibility conditions, main benefits and exclusions and cost involved were provided before you decided to apply for the policy. You therefore made a fully informed decision to proceed with the insurance.

As a result I am sorry to advise that I have been unable to uphold your concerns in this instance. However, to reflect your valued custom the Group is prepared to offer you a payment of £750 as a gesture of goodwill without any admission of liability in full and final settlement of your complaint.

To accept my offer, all you need to do is sign and return the declaration at the end of this letter. On receipt I will arrange for the money to be applied to your current account.

If your PPI policy currently remains in force and if you do not wish to keep the policy you will need to contact your local branch giving them your loan account number and sort code. Should you wish to do this it will mean that all insurance cover provided by the policy will be lost.

The letter then goes on to explain confidently, as mentioned by sum other posts i have read regarding PPI reclaiming, that we can contact the FOS in a 'what next' section giving us details. This is another reason for doubt in my mind whether to carry on or not.

The main points we raised really, were the ones about not being informed about certain points in the agreement such as the names in the policy, it was never mentioned to us that only the first person(there were two names on the policy) was covered by the agreement. Plus additional things were not pointed out but i gather were in the small print in sum obscure place.

If anyone has any feedback or questions or any help at all on whether to continue with this, as i am a bit lost to whether i should or not, it would be appreciated. Cheers.

Willie F

di3004

Hi and welcome.

Was this the final offer decision letter?

Although they have mentioned you can take this to the FOS if your not happy - if they have not mentioned this was the actual final decision, you could write back by giving them another opportunity to ask them to reconsider because your not happy with the decision despite what their findings were on your complaint.

Tell them you stand by your reasons, and the policy was worthless to you, and put you out of pocket, you do not feel £750 is a reasonable offer in your circumstances.

(This offer is standard), give them say 7-14 days to get back to you on this.
However if this was the final decision I would now take it to the FOS for them to investigate.
Please be aware though it may be some time before its moved on to the adjudicator, due to the high volumes of complaints.

I do not blame you for not being happy with this offer, if you get the chance to browse the threads, most on here have been offered that amount, so obviously if your not happy take it further and either ask them to reconsider or if its already final take it to the FOS, you can do this by either ringing the FOS to post you a complaints form, or download and print the form on the FOS website.
Enclose copies of correspondence you received and anything you may have to support your complaint.
http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/consumer/complaints.htm

Keep at them, good luck and please keep us posted.;)

sunnygirls

Hi there .dont give in write back saying your not happy with there responce ,i would at least try again and if you get no joy go to fos
Good Luck Sunny

ICTAndy

Thanks for the feedback, i decided to send a letter in the morning, will keep updated with the reply i get!