insurance cooling off period costing me £55

tir21

this might be the wrong section. apologies

i went through comparison site for car insurance. in job description i entered driver and a list appeared. nothing seemed to exactly match so i put ambulance driver and bought the policy

my job involves driving doctors to visit patients out of hours.

the next day someone from the company phoned to go through the policy. when i explained ambulance driver did not exactly match my job they said they would have to recalculate. they then came back with a price of £110 more.

this is more than my renewal fee so i said obviously i would like to cancel. they said i could cancel but 55 pound fee.

i feel a bit hard done by because its not my fault their list of driver jobs did not exactly match mine. they said there is a section that says that you should not proceed with purchase if in any doubt over such things as the job but i thought you would not be being dishonest just to choose the nearest match

have i any cause to complain or hope to recover all my money?

could i argue that car taking a clinician to see a patient is a form of ambulance. it has life saving equipment on board like debrifulator. ive read a description of ambulance on wikipedia that says they dont necessary transport patients

thanks

Ypaymore

Insurance Board is here : http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/forumdisplay.php?f=21

InsideInsurance

tir21 wrote: »

they said there is a section that says that you should not proceed with purchase if in any doubt over such things as the job but i thought you would not be being dishonest just to choose the nearest match

have i any cause to complain or hope to recover all my money?

The fact they have allowed you to cancel the policy means they have accepted it was an honest mistake. If they believe you had deliberately misrepresented the facts then they would have cancelled the policy which would mean for the rest of your life you'd have to answer "yes" to the question of "have you ever had insurance cancelled or special terms applied" which can easily triple your premium.

When you are doing your job, are you using the car that you're insuring with them or is this in another vehicle? What did they decide to classify you as in the end? If it is your car, what use did you insure it for? (eg social and commuting, business, commercial?)

They are entitled to charge cancellation fees during the cooling off period, cooling off simply means you CAN cancel but not that it is free to. Your main argument is probably going to be around the classification of your job if you dont use your own car for it.

tir21

ii

thanks. no its a company car with a few adaptations. my company sorts out all the insurance.

as regards cooling off period. there comes a stage where even if there is an official cooling off period, the expense for some people ie 55 means they couldnt afford to make use of it.

from what ive found out the cancelation fee can be whatever they wish. so they would be within the law to offer insurance at £400 have a cancelation fee of 399 and still pretend there was cooling off period

more than have a canelation fee of £25 which seems a lot fairer than the 55 ive paid

InsideInsurance

tir21 wrote: »

from what ive found out the cancelation fee can be whatever they wish. so they would be within the law to offer insurance at £400 have a cancelation fee of 399 and still pretend there was cooling off period

No, you still cannot have punitive terms in contracts and so fees must be to some degree reflective of costs incurred. A good few years ago a couple of my clients were asked to provide the total average cost of cancellation to them for both NB and Renewals, not in connection with an explicit complaint but as a general review - I cannot remember off hand if it was the FSA or the FOS that was asking.

On average a NB cancellation was about 150 and Renewal around 80, the key thing that drives the cost is marketing.

On the basis you are not using this vehicle for your job and you have noted yourself as a professional driver as your day job and presumably SD&P or SD&P+C then I am surprised that their remapping of your job added 110 to the cost. What did they say you should have been classed as? Was it all additional premium or were they adding an admin fee in aswell?

tir21

ii

"On average a NB cancellation was about 150 and Renewal around 80, the key thing that drives the cost is marketing."

sorry still learning the ropes - whats NB mean?

"On the basis you are not using this vehicle for your job and you have noted yourself as a professional driver as your day job and presumably SD&P or SD&P+C then I am surprised that their remapping of your job added 110 to the cost. What did they say you should have been classed as? Was it all additional premium or were they adding an admin fee in aswell?"

they didnt mention admin costs they just said that taking into account my job and how it differed from ambulance driver - then the premium would rise by £110

im wondering now if i explaned correctly that i did not use my own vehicle - but i suppose they must have done because i was still on sdp&c rather than business