Halifax Bank won't let us cancel PPI

embelliss

Hi,
My partner and I are currently having a problem with Halifax bank.

Long story (short story below):

The loan my parner has is £7000, with interest about £10,000, and the insurance is about £4000. Meaning he'll pay £14,000 in total.

We decided to take out income insurance instead, which works out cheaper than the loan insurance... so we wrote to halifax to cancel the loan insurance, which was advised in the insurance t+c's.

Halifax wrote back saying that we had to go to the issueing branch, and take out a new loan without insurance, and this will pay back the original loan.

We went to the bank, they made an appt for the next day.
We went to the appt, and the guy there said he will do it over the phone with us, but the call centre wasn't having any of it, and told him to send us to a branch in the next town.

So he made an appt for us the next day in the other branch. which we attended.
The woman in the other branch then told us at the appt that we neet to bring all sorts of stuff like bank statements and wage slips.. so she made an appt for the next day so we could show them to her.
We were getting slightly irritated now.
So we attended the next day with all the stuff she wanted, and she tried selling us a bigger loan to cover finance my partner has on his vehicle.

Well, when it came to the point she put it through her computer, it declined!

Basically, it wouldn't give a new loan to pay off the old one. so now we are stuck with this !!!!!!! insurance.
The woman said it may have been because my partner missed one payment on the loan, which we paid immediatly when we got the reminder letter, as his work didn't pay him on the correct day, and ended up paying him a week later.
Also he is prone to not leaving enough money in this current account for direct debits, which I'm trying teach him not to, lol.


Anyway...
Short story:
We decided to take up income protection insurance, so we do not need PPI any more.
We went to bank to take off insurance on loan, in which we have to take new loan without insurance to pay off old loan.
We were declined. So now we are stuck with insurance.


Is the bank allowed to decline us to take off the insurance?

regularsaver1

The ppi is currently forming part of the agreement and that part can not simply just be removed.

The only way is repay the whole loan totally, therefore cancelling the ppi. His only other choice is to get a loan elsewhere to repay the loan, therefore cancelling the ppi

you say he has taken income protection - but what does this actually cover him for?

I have an income protection policy, but it does not cover for unemployment. It is more a health insurance policy. It also does not cover for life cover or critical illness cover. I would just say to check this over.

embelliss

regularsaver1 wrote: »

you say he has taken income protection - but what does this actually cover him for?

It covers for accident, illness and unemployment.
And we are currently getting quotes for life insurance.

On the terms and conditions for the PPI, it says
'After the first 30 days, your cover may be cancelled by giving us 30 days notice in writing'.
And then they wrote back saying we have to cancel at local branch.
Basically, they are making us run around in circles.

I think that if we tried to go else where, he will just be declined again, as his credit score probably isn't too great.

Laura_Norda

I think I'm in almost exactly the same situation. I took out a loan the other day with HBOS and signed up for their PPI. I thought I would be crafty and cancel it within the 30-day cooling off period. Now I'm thinking it may have backfired on me. On the upside it is fairly comprehensive cover, just very expensive! (About 17% extra on the repayments)

collywollys

i am having the same problem with them.

i went straight to the ombudsman because of my issue. now waiting for reponse on the grounds of mis-selling. don't know if you have looked at the ppi section of this website, the FSA apparantly say that the new loan should be on same or better terms and shouldn't penalise you in anyway.

i would contact the ombudsman asap don't bother with halifax, they will write to them on your behalf - you'll get quicker response in my view..

all the best

regularsaver1

Laura_Norda wrote: »

I think I'm in almost exactly the same situation. I took out a loan the other day with HBOS and signed up for their PPI. I thought I would be crafty and cancel it within the 30-day cooling off period. Now I'm thinking it may have backfired on me. On the upside it is fairly comprehensive cover, just very expensive! (About 17% extra on the repayments)

you must be within the 30 days, so easier for you, but still you have to do a new app

croc86

I also have had problems trying to cancel my Halifax PPI on my mortgage. I have written to them three times and spoken to them on the phone twice but they still won't cancel my PPI!! I have been trying since March and have been waiting for a response from the ombudsman!

Is it illegal to break the contract and cancel the standing order??