Swinton Ins - help re. unauthorised debit card payments

tracyc_3

Hi

Bit of background - last summer, my then neighbour wanted to start new car insurance via the internet. His debit card was not acceptable online, so i agreed to make the deposit via my card and he gave me the cash, the rest of the payments were to be made by direct debit.

Last weekend i realised £117.87 had been removed from my bank a/c by swinton's. Following a very long phone call i discovered the neighbour had defaulted on his payments, therefore Swinton took the outstanding money from my debit card. They agreed this was nothing to do with me and are refunding my card. This morning I log on to my bank account and discover they have taken another £75 + .

It would appear he had taken out another policy (house insurance), which i had no connection with and defaulted on this too, so Swinton decided to taken the outstanding payments from my card again!

They have, once again agreed to refund but are telling me they have done nothing wrong!

I am currenting the best part of £200 out of pocket, which i can ill afford.

Can someone advise me as to the best way to get my complaint taken seriously. Their attitude is 'well, we're giving you the money back'.
I can, to a degree, understand why they would use my card as a fall back to reclaim their money for the car insurance, but the house insurance was in no way connected to me so i cannot understand how they can get away with this transaction.

Apologies for the long post but i am steaming with all this!

paulofessex

I would suggest that rather than get too angry with Swinton, wait until you have the money refunded then start asking them to assist in establishing if your neighbour committed fraud by using your card details in relation to the home insurance. OK he may not of actually known the number etc etc however he may have told them to use the same card details as the car insurance therefore misleading them as surely the home insuarnce policy was a total seperate agreement. It does sound like the neighbour could be spoken with by the police. Just a thought

mikey72

Get the money back, and cancel the card, and then get a new one issued.

benoit

....Which does not work because they just continue taking money from the new card with a continuous payment authority.

dunstonh

Swinton are brokers. So, the card details may have been on file to cover anything arranged through them.

mikey72

benoit wrote: »

....Which does not work because they just continue taking money from the new card with a continuous payment authority.

Not on my debit cards.