Argos pet insurance - help needed.

joe298487

Firstly I would like to apologize if this is in the wrong area.

I have an issue with Argos pet insurance and I really need some advice on what rights we have.

When my kitten was around 13 weeks old she had a fall from the top of our stairs. We took her to the vet and they took two xrays and we were told nothing was wrong with her.... it cost us 400 quid so we thought wow we better take out insurance.

so we went with Argos silver care.

Two months later my cat had a fit we took her to the vets and they said that she had a heart condition and unfortunately we had to put her down. The vet said no way was it connected to the first incident and we had no way of knowing when we took out the Argos policy.

we answered all Argos questions honestly and correctly.

We then tried to claim the £370 back for our claim and an additional £750 death care on the policy.

Argos has taken over 6 weeks to process the claim and sent many emails to our vet. We have chased them constantly, they have now refused the claim saying it was a pre-condition.

How were we supposed to know if no symptoms and no one told us. The vet has wrote to them on several occasions to say both incidents are not connected and we would not have known.

i was just after advice as to what our rights are, should we go to the financial ombudsman or go straight to the small claims cort any help on this is much appreciated.

looking at Argos FB & Twitter this seems to be a regular problem with them

Quentin

When you are in dispute with an insurer it's usually better to exhaust the complaints procedure first before considering legal action.


That is because the complaints procedure is at no cost to you (win or lose) AND should you escalate to the FOS their ruling is only binding on the insurer (not you), leaving you the option of legal action should you lose at that level and still want to pursue the matter.


When you use the small claims court then you pay all court fees upfront and need to win in court to be able to get them reimbursed to you by the loser.

sheramber

follow the complaints procedure

Complaints
If you believe that RSA have not delivered the service you expected, we want to hear from you so that we can try to put things right. If you
have cause for complaint you should initially contact our Customer Service Centre on 0845 078 7501. In the unlikely event that they are
unable to resolve your concerns, your complaint will be referred to our Customer Relations Team who will arrange for an investigation on
behalf of our Chief Executive.
If they cannot resolve the matter to your satisfaction, they will provide you with our final response so that you can, if you wish, refer the
matter to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
This does not affect your right to take legal action.
Argos Pet Insurance Customer Relations Team
PO Box 2075
Livingston
EH54 0EP

Financial Ombudsman Service
South Quay Plaza
183 Marsh Wall
London
E14 9SR

Ian011

sheramber wrote: »

If you have cause for complaint you should initially contact our Customer Service Centre on 0845 078 7501.

FCA regulations effective 26 October 2015 do not permit the use of premium rate 084, 087 or 09 numbers for contact by existing customers. If you have already called the 0845 number they must refund your call costs.

Additionally, promoting a premium rate 084, 087 or 09 number without mentioning call costs is a breach of Ofcom regulations effective 1 July 2015.

Some people might assume the rest of their business dealings take the same lax attitude towards various other regulations.

Quentin

Ian011 wrote: »

If you have already called the 0845 number they must refund your call costs.


Some people might assume the rest of their business dealings take the same lax attitude towards various other regulations.

You over react to the phone number posted in #3 which was actually a helpfully copied/pasted section on argos pet insurance complaints procedure by sheramber.


Unfortunately the info shown is out of date.


Eg The correct address is now:


Argos Pet Insurance Customer Relations Team P O Box 255 Wymondham NR18 8DP


The phone number you are so upset about was changed to 0345 078 7501 some time ago to comply with the regs you regularly seem to scour the forum to air to us! (Though the correct number to ring is now 0345 078 7500)


And your comments about their "business dealings" look to be just your bleat often repeated here regarding 0845 numbers, though again are misplaced.

zagubov

They were one of the better pet insurance companies a few years back and then they changed their providers. The fees went up and the policy became very complex. We switched elsewhere and never looked back.