CAG 39 percent fee on ppi

lickybits

after months of getting cold calls and messages from the
Claims Advisory Group (CAG) i agreed to them sending me a pack and filling in details of a loan in had nearly 15 years ago.

thought nothing of it now i have received a cheque from the bank for over £2000... i was surprised as i never expected anythink.

now i have received an invoice from the CAG stating i owe them 39% of it as a fee (is this right) i expected to get charged somethink may be 10-20% but 39% seems very steep.

should i pay, need advice, i know that i would never of filed the claim myself so even after paying fee i still have £1000+ more than i would of otherwise..

just seems rather steep, its quote on invoice as admin charge £0.00
successful service fee £841.12

bazzyb

lickybits wrote: »

should i pay,

Yes. You asked them to do something on your behalf, you need to pay them what you agreed.

Would you change your mind about paying a builder/plumber/etc after they had completed work for you?

Duno

Hello
Once you signed the form with CAG, does anyone knows until when they can act on your behalf? I signed the form in 02/2012 and I have received an invoice now!

Why can they act on my behalf after 2yrs!? There must be an expire date on the service they can provide with this form!

Thx

tomtontom

Have they successfully reclaimed on your behalf? If so, they have up to six years to invoice you for their fee.

-taff

And even if they don't complain successfully about anything they can charge you a 'reasonable fee' for their work.

roonaldo

It's free to complain so you could have saved a lot of money. You need to start trying to understand what you sign up for.

magpiecottage

I think the lesson is that you need to establish what you are signing up for and how much it will cost you BEFORE, not after you commit yourself.

brux508RXH

Dear Forum colleagues.

I unfortunately had dealings with the so called Claims Advisory Group (CAG) and feel their conduct throughout has been appalling, never mind the 42% fee they took form me, totalling £2,315. This does not include, the number of nasty calls and continuing cold calls to try and elicit further business and recommend them to friends and family. The best way to explain my circumstances, is my formal complain to them and apologies for length. However, you will get the jist, and also see their records of contact and conduct is not what one would expect from a reputable company that represents thousands of people. I will be taking this further, however, please be aware, that some members of staff from the CAG have joined this forum and do monitor and respond on ocassions with negative advice. Their responses however, do stick out, like a sore thumb.

My complaint is as follows and I have been in contact with other legal advice and media to ensure their conduct does not go unnoticed.

Complaint - Thank you for your email response, which I appreciate.

It's unfortunate that you cannot confirm the calls made to me on Thursday 17th April, as I have no record of any calls made to my landline number that day and was working at home. I will point out that I have not been contacted via my landline from your company before, and therefore question the accuracy of your records.

However I can confirm two telephone calls were made to my mobile number on 17th April at 10.51 hours and 14.39 hours. I also had a witness present with me at the time of the calls and both calls are registered with my smartphone and phone provider, including the duration. Both calls were made from the same number, which is registered to your company. The two male callers were different people, and both informed me that your organisation could offer 'good news' and further claims on any previous store cards, car loans, etc, if PPI was miss sold. I was also asked to recommend your company to friends and family if they had similar issues. I informed the first caller I was not interested in any new claims that your company has to offer, and ended the call before he could explain the full script. However, I was called again, by a different person, asking the same again. I declined any offer, stating that I was not interested. I feel I was quite reserved and decent on the phone on both occasions, considering I was organising my Mother's funeral in a few days’ time. Something I told Ian (the Manager of Leon the week before).

Can I please point out that I emailed your organisation at 15.55 on the 16th April, but also left a message through your website page contact earlier that day, indicating no further contact and disappointment with your company's service. I can understand your 24 hour policy, to update your database, however, for a second person to call within the same day after letting your company know I was not interested, represents very poor communication within your call centre/sales team, and indicates to me your company is not out there to help, but to hard sell and pressurise people into further unwanted contractual obligations.

To be very blunt and honest, I will no longer be a cash cow for your company, to milk money from me, which really, you have no ethical right to claim. I was extremely disappointed with the approach and subsequent service of your company from the initial 'cold call' and repetitive 'cold calls', to ascertain if I had previous PPI loans. I am still unaware where and how you ascertained my details and my work mobile number.

After many weeks of hard sell, I eventually signed your form, however, Barclays Bank had actually sent me the full set of forms for the claims and I completed these myself, and sent them back to Barclays before I signed your second set of forms. Leon from your company phoned me chasing up these forms and advised me to ignore Barclay’s forms as your company would be making the claim. However, it was too late as I had sent these to Barclays. My main reason for initially ignoring your forms was that they lacked detailed information which, I was able to provide to Barclays. For example, I gave details of how the sale was made, the location, their approach, even the room I was taken to at their Penarth Branch, including the bank manager and financial advisor's names (the same as my previous complaint to Barclays in 2006). Therefore, I believe, I did most of the PPI claim work myself, and most certainly, more than your company did on my behalf, as you had no detailed information.

To put this into perspective, as I mentioned before, I made a complaint to Barclays Bank, back in 2006, complaining I had been miss sold PPI. However, they informed me that the staff responsible had left the bank and they were no longer responsible. A very poor response, I agree, but this of course, was before PPI hit the headlines and banks admitted to mass miss selling of PPI, and laying the foundations for companies like Claims Advisory Group, to make an industry and profit from miss sold PPI. I therefore did most of the work long before your company submitted a few template forms which I know are freely available on the internet, and your company uses.

On a more technical note of the conduct of your company, I was hounded by telephone regularly on a cold call basis to sign a PPI pack (the calls are similarly logged as your contact number for me is my work mobile). I delayed the decision, as your records will show, however eventually, I signed your form, which I realise will be your sole defence in your response. However, I can point out, that at no time, did any of the multiple callers point out your fee rates, and that you would be taking in excess of 39%, which I feel is a ridiculously excessive fee and not a reasonable charge for your service. After receiving the PPI claim from Barclays in April, you have actually received 42% of the fee refunded, and indicated to me that the percentage is based from the full amount allocated from the PPI. However, I did not receive the full amount as Barclays pay HMRC tax before making payment. Your company is fully aware of this and never pointed that out to me. Although I received considerably less, once tax was deducted and this cannot be reclaimed from HMRC, your company has taken more than you expressed in your contract. The charge therefore, is 42% of the PPI claim received, for posting a few template forms, which did little more than confirm the claim forms I submitted.

Shortly after I received the letter from Barclays and cheque, I had a chase-up call from Leon, who was very abrupt and only interested in how I would make payment to your company. He quoted the fee, however, I called back, spoke to Leon and questioned the percentage rate of the fee. I was greeted with aggressive and repetitive shouting of my first name and being told 'stop cutting me off' when in fact I was only trying to be reasonable and ask for the clarification of the percentage fee. Leon was very impertinent, asking that I also give the name of my current bank, where I work and work contact number. I found this unreasonable and not necessary, however, Leon then went on to say this was only to confirm security reasons. I asked for Leon’s full name to make a complaint and he refused stating he would only give a first name. I think this was unreasonable, considering Leon was asking for my employer’s name, work number and bank, not considering he knew my full name and home address.

I was then passed on to Ian, who I believe is a manager, and more empathetic. Ian kindly explained the reasons behind the percentage, and although his approach was less aggressive, he pointed to contractual obligations and new legislation, eventually admitting that I had lost out and would not recoup the tax because of my circumstances (being in full time employment and on the highest tax rate). I was also told 'where do we set the percentage at, what you actually receive, or from what banks provide before tax'. I consider this a very poor response, and to me, is further benefiting your company and was not made clear at any time in your contact.

During the PPI claim process, I believe the feedback from your company was very poor, during the claim, receiving just two phone calls from Leon within a few days, stating the same information on both calls, which told me nothing more than I found out from Barclays myself. I was told I had ten claims and was given no information on the status of the claims, other than Barclays have received them and would have to respond (which I knew, as I completed their forms). I was also told by Ian, that your company can do more than individuals representing themselves, with your expertise and challenge to banks including chase up calls and comprehensive contact with the bank in question. On an additional note, your website link for claimants also did not work and after logging in, I received an automated request that I should contact your office to help resolve the problem with logging in (that indicated to me that your website does not regularly work). That was when the real alarm bells started ringing and I conducted research including reviewing and contacting various legal colleagues. I believe under the ‘Conduct of authorised persons rules’ issued by the Ministry of Justice, your company has fallen short of the general rules.

Having subsequently taken legal advice on this complaint, I intend to take this matter further, including contacting several media organisations to highlight my story with the Claims Advisory Group, and feel I have the evidence and a reasonable argument to at least point out the practices and warn others. I truly believe Barclays behaved very irresponsibly in selling me unnecessary PPI, which placed me in financial debt and difficulty for years, however, instead of receiving redress, your company has treated me in the same way, and charged me fees which are unreasonable, whilst providing a poor service which only benefits the Consumer Advisory Group.

I know you will have received various complaints from many other people and your testimonials are obviously screened.

I hope this is of assistance and clarifies the key points of my complaint.

[Deleted User]

Your post is far too long to elicit a considered response, but I don't think you're going to get anywhere complaining how much they charge for their services, additional calls trying to sell you their services or any complaint about charging of VAT.

Thanks for making others aware of the pitfalls of using a Claims management Company..

brux508RXH

Thanks for the response. I believe you have to speak out to stop this practice and I'm still going to try and not let these sharks off the hook. I had an interesting reply from CAG, which is full of holes, inaccuracies and brings in a interesting company called 'Reactiv Media'. I believe recently banned from by the Direct Marketing Commission. We can only hope.