Bill of £800 to be paid

MsCooper

I passed in 2014 and the first thing I did was, to ring my Insurance Company to tell them that I am now a full qualified driver! Isn't that what everybody does right?

So two years ago passed when I passed my test and they didn't even bother to update my bell insurance policy!! my car Insurance emailed me today and said a change has been made to my policy and because I now have a full Auto UK licence this means that I have to pay a balance of £800.60 and it's this month it has to be in by!! without any notification and has to be paid before or after the 15'th of August!

I rang my insurance up, they said because you now have a full licence you will have to pay. I said I rang up the day after I had passed and said I now have a full licence and not a provisional one. They said they have no record of me having one. And no phone call was notified. I said the person working at your call centre two years ago didn't obviously put in the details in correctly so they were not doing a job properly that is not my fault that is your fault I said.

Anyone else had this experience before?

I am thinking about writing to them, what would you do x

Quentin

Ask to pay on the drip.

k3lvc

MsCooper wrote: »

I passed in 2014 and the first thing I did was, to ring my Insurance Company to tell them that I am now a full qualified driver! Isn't that what everybody does right?

So two years ago passed when I passed my test and they didn't even bother to update my bell insurance policy!! my car Insurance emailed me today and said a change has been made to my policy and because I now have a full Auto UK licence this means that I have to pay a balance of £800.60 and it's this month it has to be in by!! without any notification and has to be paid before or after the 15'th of August!

I am just so shocked that they didn't even update my licence on my car to a full licence. I rang them up, had a row on the phone and they said I need to ring up my service provider to show Bell Insurance evidence of a phone call being made to them!!! I have had two numbers in the past year. I have also have been stalked so had to change my number many times how on earth can I get evidence for a phone call to them? Isn't it them who are at fault? Every time I have rang up Bell Insurance I have spoken to different people and been put on hold when I have called them up!

Anyone else had this experience before?

I am thinking about writing to them, what would you do x

Can't quite understand the timelines on this and having a row with them over the phone is never a good idea.

IIRC you've had at least one renewal of your policy since passing your test but apparently have never told them you only had an automatic licence rather than Full UK manual and they now want to charge you the higher premium

In reality if this is the case you need to pay up - no amount of trawling through old phone bills will show them the contents of the call. You could try an SAR for all the details they hold on you (inc recordings of calls) but you're unlikely to get a response before the deadline

MsCooper

You have read me wrong there,

I was learning in a Automatic and passed in a Automatic and I did tell my insurance holder in 2014 I had passed. Now they are charging me £800 and for what? why on earth should I pay for something I haven't done? they have obviously done a error somewhere!

Quentin

You went from a learner to a ( more expensive to insure) new full licence holder.

Your insurer has now discovered this and wants paying the correct premium.

You will have received renewal docs showing you to be a provisional licence holder in the interim!

You do owe them!

MsCooper

I am not in the wrong here! Maybe you work for a Car Insurance firm as you seem to be siding with them! But I told them I passed immediately in a automatic car.The renewal docs actually said I am a uk full licence holder says in my papers! what is so weird that people in a call centre can't even do a basic !!!!ing job!

Quentin

Your op says they didn't " update" your licence??

If they are in the wrong make a formal complaint and take it from their reply.

k3lvc

MsCooper wrote: »

I am not in the wrong here! Maybe you work for a Car Insurance firm as you seem to be siding with them! But I told them I passed immediately in a automatic car.The renewal docs actually said I am a uk full licence holder says in my papers! what is so weird that people in a call centre can't even do a basic !!!!ing job!

Given your attitude I'm out - good luck but suggest you find the £800 quickly before your insurance record is trashed

Kim_13

While someone with a full auto licence is charged more than someone with a full manual one, it's only slightly more and is certainly not £800.

The insurance company has obviously had the OP down as a provisional licence holder. I was a named driver on a policy (different company) when I passed and the policyholder had to push them as they didn't seem to be with it when he was telling them that I had passed. Not every driver (OP included) expects full licence insurance to cost more than provisional (although it does, it's just a question of how much) and there are incompetent operatives in every company.

I would certainly never do business with this company again. They will probably cancel the insurance if not paid by the date and you are still with them, so I'd stay out of the car until the mess is cleared up.

I would be minded to dispute as they have denied you the chance to look for a more competitive price elsewhere as you believed their pricing to be correct. Also, given you're a new driver, technically you could have had your licence revoked under the New Drivers' Act (driving with provisional insurance on a full licence means you're not covered = 6 points within the first two years and do both tests again.) So the cover they were providing was worthless anyway, and is not retrospectively valid because you pay up - they have only just made the change! If there'd been an accident and they'd decided you were on file with a provisional, they'd have refused to pay out and you'd have had to cover the damage.

Do you have any documentation from them showing you as a full licence holder? Is this for the full period or just part of it?

It's a mess and feels as though they're holding a gun to your head as they can trash your record if they don't agree that you don't owe the money.

How convenient that they don't have a recording of the phone call. They must have got the information for the recent change from somewhere so where was it from if they haven't been reviewing their records and discovered that you did in fact inform them?

Of course if they have given you full licence insurance but charged it as provisional then this changes matters slightly as you were properly insured and your only angle is that they have denied you the opportunity of finding a better price elsewhere.