First central insurance - corrupt policy + demanding payment

soad_x83

Hi All,

First post for me - great forum - thanks for all the wisdom you have embelished on me over the last few years!

I took out an insurance policy with FirstCentral at the begining of the year. Everything seemed to go fine and I got an insurance policy document.
Yesterday I tried to change my policy ( new mini cooper ) and no one could find my policy details. It eventually conspired that my policy was 'corrupted' during the order process. This meant that I have been improperly insured for the the last 8 months! I was duly informed that my insurance policy would be ceased as of today and that I would recieve a full refund. I thought that was fair but this morning I recieved an email telling me that I had to pay £150 in non-paid direct debits!

Surely I should not have to pay this given that I was not properly insured. Am I covered by the law in this situation? I dread to think what would have happened if I had to make a claim or was asked to proove my insurance to the police!

dacouch

If they are ceasing cover from today then they obviously regard you as being on cover and you would have expected them to have paid claims.

Sending an email to advise you cover is ceasing today is not on as gives you no time to rearrange cover, in addition it is in breach of the contract (Policy).

Here is the relevant wording from their policy.

The insurers have the right to cancel this policy at any time by instructing us to send to you seven days
written notice at either the email or postal address last known to us. If a claim has been made during the
period of cover no refund of premium will be given by the insurers, otherwise the insurers will return the
premium paid less an amount for the time it has been in force. This applies in all circumstances regardless
of your premium payment method.

http://www.1stcentralinsurance.com/download/PolicyWording.pdf (Page 22)

If I were you I would bring the above to their attention (Any Insurer with any level of competence would know their own cancellation procedure) and advise them you want seven days notice.

With regard to the £150 they are asking for is this for missed instalments, if so have they actually taken any money out of your account.

P.S Feel free to leave a review of 1st Central here http://www.reviewcentre.com/reviews232123.html

Quentin

soad_x83 wrote: »

I was duly informed that my insurance policy would be ceased as of today and that I would recieve a full refund. I thought that was fair but this morning I recieved an email telling me that I had to pay £150 in non-paid direct debits!

Why are they "ceasing" your policy? Ask them, and get their answer in writing - it looks from their request for money for unpaid dds that they could be cancelling due to your default. This would be bad for you if that's the case (meaning you have a cancelled policy on your hustory which will make it hard to get insurance in future).

If they do say they are cancelling due to defaulted dds, then you need to escalate this to get the policy reinstated, and the cancellation expunged from your record. (If they say its due to their error, then you need this in writing should this rear up in the future)

dunstonh

Have you asked them what is going on? Some communications are automated and occur even if something else has been agreed.

soad_x83

Thanks for the quick reply.

I could in no clear terms find out whether I was covered or not on the policy. With a company like this I suspect I am covered in this situation and not covered if I were to make a claim. Yesterday (on the phone) I was promised a full refund! That is the amount i've paid into the account regardless of direct debit transfers.
There was an initial problem with the direct debit setup but I rectified the situation with them. I'm not sure if payments have come out of my account previously but they don't look to have been coming out recently. The direct-debit payments were not rejected from the bank, they simply did not happen. Am I liable to insure the direct debits are going through?

I had no problems with firstCentral before yesterday (although I had little to do with them). Everything seemed to go smoothly and quickly and they offered a good rate. Such a shame...

soad_x83

Okay - it seems I may have used some abiguous wording. Communication has been over the phone until the point that I recieved an email this morning

Your Car Insurance Policy with 1st Central has been cancelled with effect from 24/08/2010 due to there being an error with your policy. Upon cancelling your policy, it has come to light that a direct debit agreement has never been in place, therefore there is an outstanding balance on your account of £145.20. Please contact us within the next 14 days to settle this account. We accept payments by Credit or Debit card. Please note if you choose to settle by Credit Card a 1% service charge will be applied.

Please contact our Policy Services Department on 0845 194 9930, our lines are open 9am -5pm Monday-Friday and 8am-4pm Saturday. Failure to resolve this matter may result in further action being taken.

We agreed informally (not written) that my policy will close. I wanted to be rid of the company. I was not aware of the repurcussions of them giving me a bad rating for non-DD payment at the time.



I took out an insurance policy with Admiral for the Mini last night so I really don't want to reinstate the account.

dacouch

Your working on the assumption that 1st Central are a well run company staffed by competent staff, if you have a look through the tinternet or even MSE you will find many reports about their ineptness. I think from memory there has been at least one similar case to yours although on that one they did not agree to waive the fee (I might be wrong).

In your dealings with them on this you need to assume that they will keep changing their mind, personally I would be recording any calls with them, advise them at the start of the call you are doing this

P.S I have just found an MSE poster who had a similar problem to yours see post 203 https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/35866787#Comment_35866787 also see post 191

Quentin

It sounds like whoever you spoke to on the phone wasn't in full possession of the details (eg. how can they refund you if they haven't been paid anything).

As already advised, you need to get the reason behind this cancellation explained to you in writing so that you can dispute it should they be actually cancelling due to your default.

Quentin

soad_x83 wrote: »

I was not aware of the repurcussions of them giving me a bad rating for non-DD payment at the time.

It's not just that they may have put a black mark on your credit file, but if they are marking your policy as cancelled because you defaulted on the payments.

(When taking out insurance, you are asked to say whether you have ever had a policy cancelled by a previous insurer, and usually when a potential insurer discovers this, they won't entertain having you as a customer).

If they agreed to cancel as a goodwill gesture, (which is most unusual, and also means you get no NCD for the part year), then get this in writing from them! (Admiral may get in touch regarding this - if 1st central have marked your policy cancelled by them following repeated dd failure)

soad_x83

I'm pretty sure I paid an initial fee that went through ( I will need to clarify this with the bank) - so I have paid money to them.

See the email quoted in post #6. Would I need an elaboration on this 'error in policy'? I did not default on the payment - the payments were not set up in the first instance.

Thanks for all of your help

Quentin

Yes - see if they will confirm they have cancelled the policy following their error.