auto renewals

Cyberman60

stugib wrote: »

Did you offer to show them you were dual-insured? That should be enough to get a refund in most cases.

The problem was that as I was going away for six weeks and my car would be garaged and disabled at my house, so I did not want to insure until I returned, thus saving a month's insurance. The RAC did make an allowance from when I was double-insured from July but wanted to bill me a cancellation fee regarding the outset of insurance from end-of June.

I did not think it was fair bearing in mind I had told my bank and the fact that I had tried to cancel by phone for 22 minutes. Anyway, I won in the end after they realised I was indeed serious about going to the Financial Ombudsman after they had set their debt collectors 'CARS' on me. It was only 40 quid but the principle was important to me.

zaax

Of course the car wouldn't have been replaced if the house had caught fire and burnt your car whilst you were away.

Cyberman60

OlliesDad wrote: »

Although it's not obvious, quite often it is better for the consumer. In the industry I work in we are able to offer lower pricing because auto-renew generates greater retention rates and therefore the fixed costs can be spread across a higher amount of units.

In addition, many customers prefer to just forget about renewing (as long as the price is reasonable). This ensures constant continuation of the service.

It's better for new customers maybe, but not for those that remain. It's virtually always best to change every year in my experience for the best premiums. In the past few years I've been with ABC, RAC, AA, Bluebird, LV amongst others, and the last two years I've got cashbacks of over 70 quid in total.:p

Cyberman60

zaax wrote: »

Of course the car wouldn't have been replaced if the house had caught fire and burnt your car whilst you were away.

Indeed, but my car is only worth about 500 quid anyway and I take the highest excess to keep premiums low, so they would not pay out.

Cyberman60

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Cancelling payment is not how to cancel a policy. Just the same as your employer refusing to pay you isnt a legitimate way to tell you that you were sacked last month. Best case it results in your insurance being void for non-payment and you then have to declare that for life. Worst case they treat it as no intent to pay and load a fraud indicator to CIFAS


Given insurers write to you 2-3 weeks before your renewal date why did YOU leave it until the last minute to bother to try and contact them if you knew your holiday was coming up? What if you'd had the same issue buying your new insurance and getting through to the insurer? You'd have just left your vehicle uninsured and broken the law?

I received the letter of renewal on the morning of the same day I was going to fly !!
Since 2009 the banks have to stop payment of CPAs !!
If they had stopped it the Insurance company would have been aware I had no wish to renew.

InsideInsurance

Cyberman60 wrote: »

The problem was that as I was going away for six weeks and my car would be garaged and disabled at my house, so I did not want to insure until I returned, thus saving a month's insurance.

Unless the vehicle is SORNed it legally must be insured since the law changed back in June 2011 - see http://www.confused.com/car-insurance/articles/drivers-unaware-of-continuous-car-insurance-enforcement-rule

InsideInsurance

Cyberman60 wrote: »

I received the letter of renewal on the morning of the same day I was going to fly !!
Since 2009 the banks have to stop payment of CPAs !!
If they had stopped it the Insurance company would have been aware I had no wish to renew.

No. Most insurers dont take payment at the same time as renewing the policy, some it can be as late at two weeks later.

By that point you've been on cover and owe the money. Cancelling payment does not equal cancelling the policy.


And what would have happened if it arrived 1 day after you left for your 6 week holiday? Very evidently you had forgotten about it otherwise you'd have called earlier to sort it out. Without auto renewal it'd have lapsed and you would have come back to a fine for a breach of the Continuous Insurance Enforcement which is a much bigger issue than a phone call to advise you dont want to auto renew

OlliesDad

Cyberman60 wrote: »

It's better for new customers maybe, but not for those that remain. It's virtually always best to change every year in my experience for the best premiums. In the past few years I've been with ABC, RAC, AA, Bluebird, LV amongst others, and the last two years I've got cashbacks of over 70 quid in total.:p

Yes, it is true that renewing members do subsidise the offers made to new members. We do rely on apathy quite strongly from a profitability point of view. If everybody became more MSE I suspect the new member discounts/offers would dry up.

wealdroam

Cyberman60 wrote: »

Since 2009 the banks have to stop payment of CPAs !!
If they had stopped it the Insurance company would have been aware I had no wish to renew.

But cancelling a CPA does not cancel the underlying contract.

As the FCA say:

Customers can generally cancel a CPA with the merchant as well as with their bank, although they are still responsible for any money they owe.

MSE's article on the subject says:

Can I still cancel the payment with my bank if I owe the company money?

Yes. The bank or card provider has to stop payments when you ask it to.

However, think carefully before you do this, as you will still owe any monies still due under the contract. If you had a gym membership which still had three months to run, then you would need to make alternative payment arrangements with the gym.

Paully232000

OlliesDad wrote: »

Yes, it is true that renewing members do subsidise the offers made to new members. We do rely on apathy quite strongly from a profitability point of view. If everybody became more MSE I suspect the new member discounts/offers would dry up.

That's very true, long-live auto-renewal:)