AA Renewal automatically upgraded and charged me for new Silver Membership

mooch

I got my renewal letter for AA breakdown cover. We don't drive much and are on the basic roadside. Now on the website you can get roadside for £30 as a new customer. However in my renewal letter AA have decided to 'renew' my membership to the new Silver Membership.

Cost £42.12 and that's with an automatic 25% discount. For this they give me free services like European cover and technical advice, all of which I don't need and didn't ask for.

I can't believe the cheek to bump up the cost of my membership and then make out they're giving me all these extra benefits for free. They must be making alot of extra £££s this way.

Called them up and they offered me simple roadside for £30, but I cancelled. Didn't tell AA, but will get wife to sign up to new membership throught TCB for £19.19 cashback.

im-lost

And where is the problem? They have offered you a service,
you have declined to take the offered service.

mooch

The problem is that they didn't offer me a service. They wrote me a renewal letter because my roadside service was due for renewal and in this letter they said I 'qualified' for silver membership and proceeded to state the price for renewal and that it would be automatically collected from my account with no further action.

It is one thing to offer a service but entirely another to automatically change my level of service without any action from me.

wealdroam

mooch wrote: »

The problem is that they didn't offer me a service. They wrote me a renewal letter because my roadside service was due for renewal and in this letter they said I 'qualified' for silver membership and proceeded to state the price for renewal and that it would be automatically collected from my account with no further action.

It is one thing to offer a service but entirely another to automatically change my level of service without any action from me.

But they told you it would be automatically collected, and they clearly gave you the opportunity to decline their offer.

All you had to do was phone them and say "thanks for the offer, but I really don't need the silver membership. While we are talking, is there any way my renewal can be nearer that offered to new customers?"

pb3

wealdroam wrote: »

But they told you it would be automatically collected, and they clearly gave you the opportunity to decline their offer.

All you had to do was phone them and say "thanks for the offer, but I really don't need the silver membership. While we are talking, is there any way my renewal can be nearer that offered to new customers?"

Lemme get this straight...

You believe it is acceptable business practice for a company to unilaterally sign you up on renewal on an opt-out basis to a different product with more expensive terms to what you agreed with them? :eek:

Well sorry - at the very least this is sharp practice and I would imagine highly dubious as to the new terms being legally enforceable.

And to what end? While it may bring in more revenue - it can generate bad feeling on the part of customers hoodwinked into purchasing a more expensive product. If that were to happen to me I'd be ripping the AA a new one...

Don't get me started on the ethics of auto-renewing contracts

Mindless_Clone

To be fair pb3, technically we we're not being signed up to a more expensive product...supposedly. We don't actually have a choice as we're supposedly being given the Silver Membership at no extra charge. I have just had exactly the same renewal letter. This is the relevant bits snipped: (bolded by me):



"Your AA memebership comes up for renewal on 8th August 2012. As you have been a member of the AA for the past year you will qualify for our new silver membership when you renew. With this you get more breakdown cover at no extra charge, plus free extra benefits which you can see listed overleaf and in the enclosed leaflet...

As you pay by continious annual payment you do not need to do a thing to renew your cover. We will collect £121.85 on or around the 8th August..."




BUT... it is more expensive actually. Last year my renewal (roadside and relay) cost me £57.50. I was quoted £115 but argued with them about that (previously it had always been around the £70ish mark as a joint membership and we'd renewed it by credit card as a one off payment). Eventually they said if I took continuous renewal then I qualified for 50% discount. I can see why they wanted me to do continuous renewal now; hoping I'd be conveniently too busy to spot the massive price hike I suppose and let it renew. I can see I'm going to have to go through the same song and dance again this year. *sigh* I think I'll join pb3 on the autorenewal whinge soapbox.

Just to add, I have been an AA customer for many years and have always been fairly happy with them - my next door neighbour is a patrolman (hence why I don't bother paying for the homestart ) - and had joint membership with my husband up until his death in 2010. When I renewed last year (first time since his death) because it was in his name initially - although paid by a joint credit card and with me as a named member - they "reset" my join date to 2011. I wasn't very happy about that so don't have much loyalty to them these days.

So I say phone them and haggle and if they won't reduce it, take your business elsewhere.

EDIT: I have just checked the AA website and new member cover for my package is £74. Actually, I can get equivalent of that for considerably less if I take the option through my car insurance.

rhodie

I also had the good news early in 2013 that I was being upgraded to Silver Membership. Whereas I paid £40.88 a year ago for the basic Roadside cover the Silver Membership would cost £74.40 for extra benefits like Accident Assistance, 24-hrs of European Breakdown Cover, Legal and Technical Advice etc. but the leaflet with the small print had not been sent. If I agreed to continuous annual debit card payment this could be reduced to £57.74. As my wife was planning a spring trip to Switzerland I thought it a bargain if only for the European cover. My mistake.

On phoning to activate the European Cover I was told that although the policy was car based and that as I took it out in my name my wife would not be covered. Suddenly the policy was not car based but person based. After some discussion it was agreed that in this case my wife would be covered. I was then told that the first day of continental driving would be free but a daily charge would then be made. At that stage I cancelled the policy. I simply misread the blurb, which was probably designed to encourage misreading. It was too good to be true.

Blue_Spartacus

The AA rewarded me for my loyalty by upgrading me to Gold and increasing my premium by 20% to £200 (roadside, home start with joint cover). I checked on their website and for a new customer this would be £125, and with the RAC it would be £126, I called them up and they reduced my premium to £130.

worried_jim

So you still paid £5 more than you needed to - not the best deal in the world.

Blue_Spartacus

Well I reckoned the extra £5 was for all the Gold membership benefits