cancelling car policy

Quentin

lisyloo wrote: »

......there are test cases and information on the FOS website, so it is possible to work out what is considered reasonable by the authorities that decide these things.

No.

The reference to car cancellation fees on FOS website just says they are ok as long as they are "reasonable".

dunstonh

The £50 figure comes from an FOS publication from about 6 years ago which shows they rejected a complaint made by someone as the insurer was able to show that £50 was reasonable. So, you often see the £50 figure being used to give an indication of what the FOS may think is reasonable. That is all.

rs65

dacouch wrote: »

As part of their regulation they were unable to pay return premiums from an Insurer to a customer until they had gone through the same process eg reconcile account and pay it.

I'm not sure that's part of any regulations but it makes sense that a broker won't refund until they get the money back from insurers. Why should the broker have to fund it for 30, 60, 90 days.

In the OPs case, the debit won't have been paid to insurers yet so no reason not to pay it back now. The debit and credit will appear on the same insurer statement.

Quentin

dunstonh wrote: »

The £50 figure comes from an FOS publication from about 6 years ago which shows they rejected a complaint made by someone as the insurer was able to show that £50 was reasonable. So, you often see the £50 figure being used to give an indication of what the FOS may think is reasonable. That is all.

But it wasn't even a reference to motor insurance anyway!

dunstonh

Quentin wrote: »

But it wasn't even a reference to motor insurance anyway!

What insurance type it related to does not matter.

lisyloo

The reference to car cancellation fees on FOS website just says they are ok as long as they are "reasonable".

It's up to the person concerned whether they want to complain or not.
I have no axe to grind either way.
But I still maintain that most "reasonable" people would not consider it a "reasonable" use of their time to complain about something where there is a concensus and even evidence that their claim is likely to be rejected.

Either way I don't care and the OP has free choice. I was just pointing out the precedent is there if the OP choses to factor it in.

I am choosing to factor in that I have better things to do with my time :-)

Quentin

lisyloo wrote: »

....But I still maintain that most "reasonable" people would not consider it a "reasonable" use of their time to complain about something where there is a concensus and even evidence that their claim is likely to be rejected.....

The way the fos works regarding complaints does favour the customer.

As it's no charge to make a complaint to the customer, and a big fee (£550 if more than 25 complaints have been raised in a year) to the insurer when a complaint is registered and the FOS wants to follow it through, there is plenty of evidence that to stop a complaint getting to the FOS the insurer will make a "goodwill gesture" to the customer.

This is because even though the insurer has a good case, the management time dealing with the FOS combined with the fee involved makes it a cheaper decision to nip it in the bud.

So always worth threatening the FOS, and carrying on with a complaint if the threat is ignored (it never costs the customer, even if the insurer wins the FOS judgement)

lisyloo

I mostly agree with you.

it never costs the customer

I personally find it something of an emotional investment to complain and also to keep tabs on it for months on my "to do" list (I've done about 6 or 7 myself and they do generally take many months).
So although there's no physical cost apart from paper, envelope and stamps, I would still factor in the emotional investment and the time taken to monitor, chase it up especially if you are a very busy person.

In this case as I know £35 is generally considered perfectly reasonsble and even on the low side so I don't think I'd bother.

dunstonh

There is also the issue that putting in a complaint where there is no wrongdoing knowing that you are effectively blackmailing the company is morally wrong.

Certainly it can be a good bit of knowledge to have if the firm is wrong and is playing hardball. However, I don't think it is something that people should do willy nilly. There have been calls to end the free to use ombudsman service due to this abuse (which is mainly by claims companies). I don't expect it to happen but it would be naive to think that this cost is not factored into premiums/fees.

Quentin

Your moral view is irrelevant.

Customers have the right to complain to the fos if unhappy with their insurer.

We don't make the rules!

If the ombudsman service is biased against the insurers that's nothing to do with the customers and up to the insurers to sort out.

It's the fos decision to make insurers pay (even when they win), nothing to do with the customers.

And don't we pay for all their mercs, conferences, Christmas parties etc too?