Admiral Insurance = Car seized + 6 pts!

P1ne4pple

My Boyfriend had an Insurance policy with Admiral, just for 1 car and had renewed in January this year. Unfortunately, in May he was made redundant and missed a couple of payments on the monthly pay scheme. He had advised Admiral ahead of time of his financial situation which was fine; by August he received an email requesting he contact them urgently. He called, went through security etc and was advised he had been sent a letter previously to notify him he had 7 days to pay off the full remaining balance or the policy would be cancelled. We did ask where the letter had gone to and were advised number 14 (we live at number 40) and so our address details were updated. Panicked, my boyfriend was able to raise the cash to pay this balance by the 7th day and during the call (speaking to an Indian woman) he was asked to confirm his 16 digit card number no less than 4 times! At the end of a frustrating call, my boyfriend was assured the payment had been processed and would show as leaving his account within the next 5 – 10 working days. She thanked him for using Admiral and we thought that was the last of it and we were insured until December when we would have to renew all over again.
This year has been particularly difficult as we have both lost jobs we had for over 4 years, whilst I was lucky enough to find employment quickly he is still going between jobs trying to make ends meet and has so far not succumbed to Job Seekers. More recently I have had bereavement in the family and the situation is highly stressful.
3 days ago we were pulled over by an unmarked police vehicle for driving uninsured. Shocked, we assured the officer this was no way intentional (although how many times would she have heard that!?) Not prepared to hear us out, we were handed a £200 fine, he was cautioned and has 6 points on his licence. The car was seized (just paid out £300 for an MOT and service!) which we have to pay £150 to retrieve + £20 a day it is impounded, this is the 3rd day so now £210. We were told if we had an issue with admiral to call and take it up with them. Neither of us got into work that day and I am greatly stressed as a result, sleepless nights have followed and I am unable to grieve properly. I called Admiral after checking our bank statements to query. On the day he called them no money had been requested from our accounts, usually if there is ‘not enough’ money in the account both the request and unpaid item will show on our bank statement, followed by a letter from the bank advising of an unpaid request. We received no such letter, the money remains untouched and we had absolutely no idea. When I called and spoke to a Manager at Admiral she advised she had listened to the call and confirmed the Operator had made a mistake, although we should have checked our statement to see the payment had gone through. I reminded her, the Operator had confirmed all was fine and that was it. The manager informed me she had sent us an email and letter to confirm our policy would be cancelled if we did not get in touch within 7 days. She claims these were sent on the 16th – but no email and I told her of course we would not have received her letter because HER employee had taken our address down incorrectly and had actually confirmed it was correct! I feel more could have been done by Admiral – if they were receiving letters back from the Post Office as ‘not at this address’ why wouldn’t they call us? Well – the answer is simple – they are an inbound call centre.

Now my boyfriend, who is an honest man and if he had known would have called them immediately to resolve, has to deal with taking a new insurance policy claiming his ‘conviction’ which has doubled what we would usually pay and because our car is ‘impounded’ only 1 company will have us. But we can’t get the car back without the insurance so we’ve had to take it. I’ve requested copies of the call recordings from Admiral as I want to contest the fine and charges and report them to the ombudsman but honestly – have I got a case? Any advice would be much appreciated, we have two days left to notify the court we are contesting but in the long run, will this cost me more and cause more stress? Anybody dealt with something similar?
Thanks :wall:

scheming_gypsy

I'd say you could be stuffed because as you say:

Panicked, my boyfriend was able to raise the cash to pay this balance

As he 'managed to raise the cash' you're saying that you didn't have it readily available. So what happened to the money? if Admiral didn't take the payment it didn't leave your bank, so if you didn't have a healthy balance you must have realised the money was still there and didn't contact Admiral to find out why it wasn't taken. Yes the call centre person made a mistake but so did you.

With regards to them receiving 'not at this address' return post; they'll only receive it if it gets sent back

FlameCloud

Why did you not raise the issue as soon as you realised the payment had not gone out of the bank account? Or wasnt it checked?

P1ne4pple

Hi, it wasn't checked, the money is still there! Although now, not enough to pay vehicle recover, insurance deposit and fine fees! He didn't have it readily available at the time no, but he got it in time to pay admiral by the date they had specified.

System

The 1st step is to persuade the insurance company to reinstate the policy with no gap in the period of cover.
If you manage that, then you also have a case to have the driving conviction overturned and the fine / storage charges refunded.

Try a phone call to head office customer services (not the call centre), if that fails write a letter of complaint, it is worth a try.

You would also have a case for compensation for the insurers mistake.

But, if you fail to get the policy reinstated, then the conviction will probably stand too.

A cancelled policy will probably remain on your record for ever and will make it difficult to obtain insurance in the future.

P1ne4pple

Ah well I tried, but they had cancelled it in September, so we've been jollying about for 5 weeks with no insurance and they wouldn't stand for it. we have now taken a different policy which is twice as much as the last because of his new 'conviction'. I just want to get back at them for causing so much unnecesary stress on top of a painful fortnight. Admiral have confirmed the Operator made an error - if they could just admit liability it needn't go to court and we would not get the fine and points, but they wont. It's very confusing as they are contradicting themselves at each turn. I just dont know if by going the official route if i'm lining myself up for further stress and dissapointment or if we can get a beneficial result. I'd like to reiterate this is NOT for financial gain or 'compensation' it is purely to clear his name and to maintain a clean licence.

silvercar

Make an official complaint. if that fails you could then take your complaint to the FOS.

You could also try emailing the CEO, if you can find their address.

JimmyTheWig

Lets assume that if it gets to court, the courts are reasonable.

It's reasonable for you to have driven the day after the phonecall with Admiral. If you'd had been caught then I'm sure you'd be fine.
It's quite reasonable for you to have driven a fortnight after the phonecall with Admiral. They said it would take 5-10 days before the money came out and you might not have checked your balance in the last few days.

But you are talking weeks and weeks after the phonecall with Admiral. Now it sounds like you are the sort of people (like many of us) who run their bank accounts quite close to the wire. You sound like the sort of people who would need to check their balance at least weekly.
In which case it is not reasonable to suggest that you didn't notice the money hadn't been taken. And if you'd noticed this then at least some of the responsibility falls on you.

It is more reasonable to think (unless you can provide good arguments to the contrary) that you realised Admiral hadn't taken the payment and hoped that they'd forgotten but you were still covered. I.e. the court will probably see it that you took a gamble and got caught out, so won't side with you.

P1ne4pple

Hi Jimmy, thanks for the advice. We're really not like that! We would never gamble something like the car, it is our lifeline and we dont check our balance weekly, because our money generally goes in on the 1st and is gone by the 2nd. we do get overdrawn and therefore dont bother. We didn't check the cash had gone because we had been told it was processed and would go in 5 - 10 days. We knew there was enough to cover it and so left it and did not check it because we were under the impression it was gone. Admitedly it was naive not to check but we really didn't know we had to! Honestly, we are just not those people who try to get away with murder and had we known - we would have sorted it.

Quentin

P1ne4pple wrote: »

.... we have now taken a different policy which is twice as much as the last because of his new 'conviction'. ......

Sorry if you already know this, but you do need to tell your new insurer about the cancelled policy (as well as the conviction).

(If you didn't do so, then when they realise you haven't disclosed this there will be even more consequences, another cancelled policy and even more costs)

P1ne4pple

Thanks Quentin, we have definitely done that, hence the increase in cost. They're also aware it is impounded, i'm taking no chances!