Hastings Direct Car Insurance

DJRosco

A bit peeved to say the least. Used Compare the Market to check out car insurance quotes and made the decision to go with Hastings Direct on recommendation from a friend, reasonably priced and according to the website "there is no charge if you purchase online". Low and behold right at the end of the online application (even after entering bank details) it asks you to pay an arrangement fee of £20.

The exact wording relating to their arrangement fees on the site is "A call centre arrangement fee of £12.50 is required if you buy offline, there is no charge if you purchase online".

On telephoning Hastings Direct I was told that this wording related to the call centre charge! After much discussion they suggested emailing my complaint directly which I have done and yes you have guessed it no reply. Surely they should increase their comparison quotes by £20.

I think this is totally misleading for customers wishing to compare quotes.

rudekid48

Are you sure this wasn't an arrangement fee for paying by instalments rather than setting up the policy?

DJRosco

If this is the case then still not clear, the wording just calls it an "arrangement fee"

MABLE

We went with Hastings direct for our car insurance in April and there was definately no fee for paying the full amount.

DJRosco

Thank you Mable and Rudekid, this definitely must be what the fee refers to as I had selected monthly by direct debit.

motherb

Hi out of curiosity i just checked policy with hastings and there is a £20 arrangement fee paid in full on line .

roonaldo

I took a Hastings direct policy recently and never paid this.

rs65

According to their website there is a £20 arrangement fee and an additional £12.50 if through a call centre.

http://www.hastingsdirect.com/ourFees_popup.html

Thinkingoutsidethebox2014

Car windscreen cracked after stone chipped, several calls to Hastings direct for a call out and no response received. No timescales given, just they're extremely busy and carry on driving, it won't (windscreen) cave in! Now 36hrs later we've just been told by Tracey Burns from Nationwide Autoglass HD's supplier that they haven't even logged the incident/report in their systems begs the question is the whole company in meltdown, how long will it continue to exist as a business when it can't serve it's customers when they need to be serviced? It reflects v poorly on them and their suppliers. Quite obviously service levels only exist at the lowest level which is very poor. Meanwhile crack is getting bigger and our concerns are sidelined by Hastings Direct. Have tried to get help from the customer service but instead they're fobbing us off with nonsense about the incident number being on someone else's system, hello it's 2014 and systems talk to each other but if not that's HD's problem not the customers. Rubbish objections being posed to us for e.g how the primary insurance holder has to give authorisation, all delay tactics in our opinion because the primary insurance holder gave them the authorisation on the first call over 36hrs ago and several calls later, from us not them, not one of them asked for this again except for Emma, the new call handler. Spoke to her for 40 minutes this evening without resolution because she was more intent on passing the buck/blame onto their supplier and telling us to keep calling Nationwide Autoglass. Why should we do that, we've already done that twice and they, Tracey, told us they could do nothing without HD reporting the incident to them? Having experienced for ourselves their terrible service combined with what we've read from other reviewers about them I now note not to use these people when it's time to renew the insurance and I won't be caught out through their auto renewal. Told them clearly the £1600 p.a. that they currently receive from us via our daughter (it's her car) will be stopped. We'll write a complaint to their CEO, Gary Hoffman, together with the rest of the BoD not that they care because clearly the failings have trickled down from the top, starting with poor leadership and poor training. Please avoid Hastings Direct at all costs, the £10 per year saving isn't worth it , go with a reputable company one that has positive reviews.

Hastings_Direct_company_representative

Hi Thinkingoutsidethebox2014,

Thank you for taking the time to post your review, I am very sorry to hear that you have been having trouble with your windscreen replacement. We would very much like the opportunity to link your feedback to a policy so that we can investigate what has happened and try to improve the process. Can you please contact me directly and provide the policy details? help@hastingsdirect.com

Many Thanks,
Jamie

[Deleted User]

I would avoid Hastings at all costs. Just look at the number of complaints on this forum. You might pay a few quid more elsewhere but it's worth it.