Car insurance took so long paying my wife got a CCJ

hegedusa_2

My wife had an accident in April 2013. Our insurance company agreed to pay the third party's costs (repair, loan car etc.) totalling approx £800. We started getting phone calls from the third party's solicitors in June asking for payment and we kept telling them to contact our insurance company. I phoned our insurance company each time and told them that we are getting called by these solicitors and we didn't understand why. They said basically not to worry, the matter is in hand, they're just waiting for confirmation of the amounts from the third party. In July we got letter from the solicitors saying that they intend to go to court. I forwarded this to our insurers and phoned them, and was again told not to worry and that they're being silly.

Then we got a letter saying from Northampton County Court saying that we owe this money. I forwarded this again to our insurance, and phoned them and they said not to worry, it is in hand.

Then in August we got a letter from the court saying that my wife had a CCJ issued against her and she owes £1000!!

I phoned the insurance company and they didn't really want to know at first ("the handler is at lunch", "the handler is too busy today", "we have had a bit of a backlog"), but when I said that we are going to get bailiffs knocking, they managed to rouse the handler from his slumber and he apologised for the screwup (his words) and he would be forwarding the money to the solicitors whom we had to pay.

Now, two weeks later, I STILL don't have confirmation that the money has been received, and the solicitors won't talk to me because I'm not their client!!!

So, assuming they have forwarded payment and the matter is cleared, where do we stand? I understand that my wife will have to pay (£75?) to get the CCJ cleared off the public register, and I have already made a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman. Apparently I have to make an official complaint to the insurance company and I have to wait 8 weeks for a response. If I am not happy with the response, or they don't respond, the ombudsman will act.

Can anyone help with regards to what I should put in the letter of complaint? I want to try and get some compensation for this. The number of hours spent, the stress of worrying about when (if) they bailiffs are coming, the £75 we might have to spend to get my wife's name cleared, that sort of thing. We paid good money for insurance and I don't see why we need to struggle and go through all this torment because the insurance company is incompetent and slow.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Buzby

Your compensation will be the record put straight. A CCJ that is removed has no value unless you can prove the erroneous info cause you financial losses.

You should seek at least £150 for you insurers lapses - and demand they give you an ex-gracia gesture of goodwill. Incompetence is, sadly permissible and it is up to you to seek a better insurer next time.

InsideInsurance

It may be a mistake or it may be intentional that the insurer went to court over the claim. If they went to court and lost then the judgement would of cause be filed against the driver of the vehicle at the time or the owner depending on the circumstances. Whilst the insurers deal with everything for you it is done in your name not theirs.

A decent insurer would have informed you of what was going on and prewarned you about the sort of letters you may receive and how they'd deal with them and so certainly the actions have been below the standards of some others.

Ultimately you simply need to write a complaint letter stating your concerns and what you want them to do about it. They are the ones that should be paying the fees directly rather than you doing it and then them reimbursing you.

£150 would be exceptionally generous compensation for poor communication, £50 would be a much more realistic figure unless you can demonstrate actual financial loss as a direct consequence of their actions (or lack of).

As you have already found out, if you dont get a satisfactory response or 8 weeks passes you can then take the matter to the FOS.

hegedusa_2

They definitely didn't intend it to go to court. They kept telling me nothing would happen and they're dealing with it, and even admitted their mistake saying "we screwed up"

InsideInsurance wrote: »

It may be a mistake or it may be intentional that the insurer went to court over the claim. If they went to court and lost then the judgement would of cause be filed against the driver of the vehicle at the time or the owner depending on the circumstances. Whilst the insurers deal with everything for you it is done in your name not theirs.

A decent insurer would have informed you of what was going on and prewarned you about the sort of letters you may receive and how they'd deal with them and so certainly the actions have been below the standards of some others.

Ultimately you simply need to write a complaint letter stating your concerns and what you want them to do about it. They are the ones that should be paying the fees directly rather than you doing it and then them reimbursing you.

£150 would be exceptionally generous compensation for poor communication, £50 would be a much more realistic figure unless you can demonstrate actual financial loss as a direct consequence of their actions (or lack of).

As you have already found out, if you dont get a satisfactory response or 8 weeks passes you can then take the matter to the FOS.

BertTheRaccoon

Your insurers have messed up

Is it a "default judgment" you have received notice of?

If so, the only way to make sure this comes off the register is to make sure your insurers do the following:

1- pay the damn judgment
2- Ask the Claimant's solicitors if they will agree to set judgment aside by way of a consent order, with the requirement for the judgment dated **/8/2013 to be removed from the register.
3- Ensure that the insurers follow up on this and send you a copy of the sealed order from the court.

Then when that lot has been taken care of, make sure they offer some reasonable financial gesture of settlement to you/ your wife by means of apology.

InsideInsurance

hegedusa wrote: »

They definitely didn't intend it to go to court. They kept telling me nothing would happen and they're dealing with it, and even admitted their mistake saying "we screwed up"

Obviously didnt hear the full conversation so cannot get a sense of context to "we screwed up" as that could simply be that they screwed up in keeping you informed or that they screwed up by allowing it to go to court.

Again without full details its hard to speculate. Sometime you want to go to court, sometimes you dont really want to go but think the TP wont issue and so you call their bluff and sometimes post gets lost etc and the TP issues against you.

princessnat83

Hi, sorry to hijack ur thread. I'm having a similar problem. I received court paper, forwarded to insurance company they haven't done anything and I now have a ccj. I'm really worried about this as I have credit cards and I'm worried I will have these withdrawn etc. It's been one week and the insurance company are trying to have to aye aside but in the meantime I could have my mortgage refused, credit cards withdrawn. Help! What can I do?

jaybeetoo

If you get court papers addressed to you it is your responsibility to do something about it. Forwarding them to a third party, who has already demonstrated incompetence and hoping for the best, is madness,

BertTheRaccoon

jaybeetoo wrote: »

If you get court papers addressed to you it is your responsibility to do something about it. Forwarding them to a third party, who has already demonstrated incompetence and hoping for the best, is madness,

Completely wrong.

It is the standard industry practice to pass any court proceedings to your insurer for them to appoint their legal agents to go on record and deal with the legal procedural aspects of the claim as part of their providing an indemnity to the policyholder.

Quentin

jaybeetoo wrote: »

If you get court papers addressed to you it is your responsibility to do something about it. Forwarding them to a third party, who has already demonstrated incompetence and hoping for the best, is madness,

Ignore this.

Whenever court papers are issued over an insurance clsim they are always addressed to the individual not the insurer.

You should never respond to the court and always pass the correspondence unanswered to your insurer to deal with.

If you respond yourself you jeopardise the case as well as breach your insurance policy conditions.

spacey2012

The Advice to "just send to your insurance" is very old and very bad advice.
Things have changed and you should have added your insurance on to the claim as joint defendant (counter claim), requested a hearing at your local court and taken your full insurance documents with you for the judge to read the contract.

Hope anyone reading this in a similar position takes note.
You can not trust your insurance to handle a CCJ claim, very old and very very bad advice.