were we missold mortgage life insurance

holly_hobby

Burridge60 wrote: »

You Dont even have to have contents insurance for a mortgage.

No Income Protection.

No Critical Illness.

No Death In Service.

No Pension.

No Mortgage Life Cover.

Just be immortal and of course take out Buildings Insurance as stated by the lender to protect their security.

The OP is talking about the TA within a LCE.

H

Burridge60

The opening poster talked about Mortgage Life Insurance a subsequent questioner related a tale about an endowment policy. My apologies for not reading the whole thread more throughly!

holly_hobby

SaRaH wrote: »

The point is that I wasnt informed by Halifax that when I change from endowment to replayment that I no longer had to have mge life insurance. Its simple Halifax didnt tell me and I didnt know and so I continued the mge life insurance which I would have cancelled had I known I could.

They also didn't tell you, or lead you to believe, it was a mandatory requirement of the C&I arrangement.

Re cancelling your endowment, this was not their responsibility to make any recommendation regarding this (indeed if the change was requested from anyone other than their regulated adviser, the individual would have been unable to provide any financial advice, esp when it comes to cancelling life protection). Following your request and change over to a C&I repayment method, the endowment was no longer a repayment vehicle, and if assigned it would have been released at that point, and it would be reasonable to assume that you would have sought advice from Halifax re this policy, if you were unsure as to if it was still a requirement for the mge.

Indeed it would be reasonable for Halifax to assume that you having requested the change over, were aware that a low cost endowment was no longer necessary for a C&I mge - the choice to retain or cancel/let lapse being your own.

Had you requested this change via a Financial/Mge Adviser or their own in house Mge Adviser - they may have advised (if a full find review was completed) that retaining the endowment solely for mge protection purposes, in your circs (ie. single with no dependants, and no apparent desire to leave the house unencumbered on your death (during term), for the benefit of your estate and beneficiaries)., may be considered an unnecessary expense.

Indeed, if it would also have been inapproparite to retain purely as a savings medium (for a single with no dependants), due to part of the premium going to unnecessary/none requriement of TA provision. (notwithstanding the qualifying issues discussed earlier).

As it stands, in my opinion Halifax have no case to answer in respect of you maintaining your endowment policy, post request and change of your mge repayment method from I/O to C&I 3 yrs into its term - we'll see what their Customer Liaision Team come back with.

Wish you well

H

SaRaH_3

A major problem in these financial organisations is the assumption that because they know the ins and outs of their products that their customers should know the ins and outs of their products as well. The onus is on Halifax to inform me and they didnt. BTW Ive challenged Halifax on another issue and while initially they refused to budge I persisted and they have now backed down and a wrong is being put right.

The_J

SaRaH wrote: »

A major problem in these financial organisations is the assumption that because they know the ins and outs of their products that their customers should know the ins and outs of their products as well. The onus is on Halifax to inform me and they didnt. BTW Ive challenged Halifax on another issue and while initially they refused to budge I persisted and they have now backed down and a wrong is being put right.

Did you cancel the endowment when you switched to repayment? If you did, the life cover would have stopped.

Customers would know the ins and outs of the products if they read what they were told to sign.

holly_hobby

SaRaH wrote: »

A major problem in these financial organisations is the assumption that because they know the ins and outs of their products that their customers should know the ins and outs of their products as well. The onus is on Halifax to inform me and they didnt. BTW Ive challenged Halifax on another issue and while initially they refused to budge I persisted and they have now backed down and a wrong is being put right.

But you said the problem isn't the policy, the issue is that they didn't advise you that life cover was not required for a C&I mge, and that they should have therefore told you to cancel your LCE, when you effected the amendment.

I have to be honest and say that I would wholly reject this complaint for the reasons already provided ....

Halifax may be a bit more leninet though and decide as a duty of care they should have referred you to a FA to discuss your revised protection needs (or lack of) .... but I doubt it.

If they did somehow uphold this on something akin to the above, any compensation would only be equivilent to a refund of the cost of TA only (& compound interest) applicable under the plan, and not a refund of the FULL montly premiums paid - so its doubtful you'll be able to book a fornight to paradise on it.

And I repeat that I do not believe this is a justified complaint that holds any merit, which I know will be disappointing to hear, but I believe its best to be honest in the matter.

Hope this helps

Holly

holly_hobby

The_J wrote: »

Did you cancel the endowment when you switched to repayment? If you did, the life cover would have stopped.

Customers would know the ins and outs of the products if they read what they were told to sign.

No J, thats her beef, that she maintained the endowment post switch, because Halifax did not disclose that life cover was not a mandatory requirement of a mge, and therefore advise her to cancel the existing LCE. She therefore puts the "unnecessary" continued servicing of the policy by her, very squarely at the door of Halifax - and absolves herself from any responsibility to have sought guidance or advice in connection with the switch.

You can see what I think of it.

H

The_J

holly_hobby wrote: »

No J, thats her beef, that she maintained the endowment post switch, because Halifax did not advise her that they didn't require her to have any life cover in respect of the mge, and she was using the endowment as life cover because "no one told her not to".

H

I know, but I'm trying to get her to get to that conclusion.

An endowment is an investment so the premiums were being put aside. Had the endowment returned spectacular returns on investment, would she be complaining...?

Probably :rotfl: you can't please some people.

holly_hobby

As the policy appears to have been suitable ATR wise at POS and only mge related for 3 yrs, she is going down the road that she should have been told to cancel it when she switched - and appears to be after a refund of prems

IMHO this is not a justified basis of complaint for the several reasons discussed (and the true reason may indeed be related to poor performance and a gripe - if it is she'll get a shock if upheld, and only the equivilent TA element & compound interest is refunded).

H

SaRaH_3

Its got nothing to do with poor performance of endowment, just a simple matter of not being told that I no longer had to have life insurance with a repayment mge. If there was any changes in my personal circumstances that effect mge and I didnt tell them, well.............