M&S Car Insurance cancelled

skichick73

Hi, my husband and I have had car Insurance with M&S since June last year. On Saturday we received a letter saying they were cancelling our policy with 7 days notice. I called them this morning and they can't tell me why the policy has been cancelled only to say their validation team said it needs to be! I wasn't able to speak to them and they just gave me a number to call for a company called Synetic Solutions. I have to complete a form and it could take up to 40 days before I know why the policy may have been stopped. We are due to be travelling to France in 4 weeks. As you can imagine this came as quite a shock. A horrible feeling to be told your insurance is cancelled 9 months after taking it out and with no explanation, worse still to be told to complete a form and pay £10 for the pleasure of finding out! I wondered if how they have dealt with this is right and has anyone else been in this situation?

On a positive point L&V have come up trumps and insured us after explaining everything to them......

DoaM

That £10 plus form plus 40 days is for a Subject Access Request.

How did you pay for the M&S insurance? Have they refunded any monies?

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Try here: they have a consumer helpline.
http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/technical_notes/cancelling-renewing-car-insurance.html

Synectic solutions are big data miners, and they will have some information that your insurer thinks means you fraudulently applied for the policy. This might be a mistake, or even something that someone with the same name as you has done.

skichick73

Yes they said they would be refunding us.

skichick73

Apologies this is my first post so just getting used to the system! Thanks for the info going to check it out now. We wouldn't have done anything consciously if there is something, we are not aware. Just feels so unfair that the policy is cancelled without me having a chance to know what's going on....

neilmcl

On a wider note, would this be the sort of cancellation that will count against the OP when looking for insurance going forward? Will they have to declare this?

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Yes, you are always asked if you have ever had insurance cancelled, voided declined or special terms imposed.

DoaM

Most probably - which is why they should get this resolved.

OP - you can quite easily give information in good faith and have it slap you in the face. Around September last year Mrs DoaM renewed her insurance, taking out a policy with Halifax. As I'm a named driver we declared all incidents (3 points for speeding which became spent in December, a claim for bodywork damage as vandalism, and a non-fault claim where someone reversed into me).

Between Xmas and New Year Mrs DoaM received a letter from Halifax claiming that we'd mis-reported the non-fault claim and that they were going to increase the premium and add an admin charge. On chasing things up, it seemed that the other party in the non-fault claim had accepted liability but were quibbling about costs - as such the claim showed as FAULT on the CUE database as it was still open.

Fortunately I managed to get this closed out, so no charges added, but it shows how easy it can be for something to unexpectedly hit you.

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To cancel the insurance completely, then either M&S think the OP owes them money, and isn't going to pay it- e.g. a standing order has been cancelled, in which case they would have written to say so, and give a chance to pay, or M&S regard the OP as uninsurable by them.

They might think all manner of things: e.g. that the OP has a drink drive conviction, a conviction for fraud, dangerous driving etc.

If they felt that there was an undeclared speeding fine, or minor accident, they would be more likely to contact the OP for more money, with the threat of cancellation, due to the "misunderstanding about declaring everything" when the policy was taken out.

I have to say I thought the insurer was obliged to tell you why they were cancelling, but if it is only £10 to get the disclosure report, I'd pay it, otherwise L&V will do the same when they "find out".

Johno100

facade wrote: »

To cancel the insurance completely, then either M&S think the OP owes them money, and isn't going to pay it- e.g. a standing order has been cancelled, in which case they would have written to say so, and give a chance to pay, or M&S regard the OP as uninsurable by them.

But as the OP says they are due a refund it would indicate that they probably paid in full up front.

facade wrote: »

They might think all manner of things: e.g. that the OP has a drink drive conviction, a conviction for fraud, dangerous driving etc.

If they felt that there was an undeclared speeding fine, or minor accident, they would be more likely to contact the OP for more money, with the threat of cancellation, due to the "misunderstanding about declaring everything" when the policy was taken out.

All quite plausible reasons for cancellation at or near the inception of the policy, but for things like that to only come to light 8/9 months into the the policy is very strange.

My monies on mistaken identity.

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Johno100 wrote: »

But as the OP says they are due a refund it would indicate that they probably paid in full up front.



All quite plausible reasons for cancellation at or near the inception of the policy, but for things like that to only come to light 8/9 months into the the policy is very strange.

My monies on mistaken identity.

Yes, the dataminers have just now found something that appears to link to the OP, perhaps someone with the same name has just asked for insurance quotes with a drink/drive disqualification.