Fair prices for vulnerable people

Swanseacat

Recently my income level dropped hugely so I’ve been exploring all the various things that are on offer to lower income households. As a result I’ve been helping some friends do bills audits and discovered they are being massively ripped off because they are vulnerable adults with mental health issues and / or special educational needs. They are all independent adults but with a variety of challenges.  Debt is normalised for them and their executive functioning problems prevent them doing comprehensive research - they just take the price they are offered. Paying through the nose for mobile phone data, not being told about social tariffs by water and broadband companies, unaware of disability and carers’ discounts. Just a couple of phone calls and we’ve knocked over £1k a year off annual bills.  This stuff makes my blood boil. How can we ensure that the good rates those of us get who are lucky enough to be able to shop around aren’t being subsidised by those less able? 

MattMattMattUK

Swanseacat said:

Recently my income level dropped hugely so I’ve been exploring all the various things that are on offer to lower income households. As a result I’ve been helping some friends do bills audits and discovered they are being massively ripped off because they are vulnerable adults with mental health issues and / or special educational needs. They are all independent adults but with a variety of challenges.  Debt is normalised for them and their executive functioning problems prevent them doing comprehensive research - they just take the price they are offered.

They sit in a grey area, between fully competent adult, and someone in need of care, that will always lead to issues as they try to find a balance between independence and having their affairs overseen. 

Swanseacat said:

Paying through the nose for mobile phone data, not being told about social tariffs by water and broadband companies, unaware of disability and carers’ discounts.

Providers can only offer social tariffs to those who are eligible, these things are well published, but rely on the public to take them up.

Swanseacat said:

Just a couple of phone calls and we’ve knocked over £1k a year off annual bills.

This can be doable for quite a lot of households even without social tariffs, if one is not proactive then costs invariably rise, having a quick look at the DFW board shows just how much money many people waste.

Swanseacat said:

This stuff makes my blood boil. How can we ensure that the good rates those of us get who are lucky enough to be able to shop around aren’t being subsidised by those less able? 

Generally it is the other way around, those of us who are fully functional subsidise those who are less able, higher taxes, no benefits, rates that do not include the social tariffs which are usually considerably cheaper than normal rates etc. However much of the benefit of being proactive have now gone, the SVR of energy is what almost everyone is on, water bills are very low anyway unless one wastes a lot of water, the benefits of shopping around for insurance have largely been removed etc. There is always a benefit to being proactive, but it is not as much as it once was.

bris

How is an asviser on the other end of a phone supposed to know the person they are dealing with has special needs.

The last time I phoned sky they didn't  "ask hey are you a special needs person by any chance".

You can't just blanket every one they deal with as ripping them off.

Neither can you just assume every one with special needs can't do anything for themselves, they can still be indepent.

And by the way it's not just people with special needs that get the worst tarrifs. 

I am guilty of forgeting to renew my contracts when the initial year is up, the year ends, the costs increase but we can forget and it slides until we get the time to go to the hassle of having to reshop about again.

Insurance is the worst for me, I just usually let it auto renew even though I could shop about. 

Sandtree

Vulnerable customers is a fairly sensitive matter, having worked in the world of pensions/annuities the average customer is in their 70s but you cannot assume that every customer is vulnerable, many will get insulted if you do but also some that are vulnerable may state that they arent (eg dementia on a good day)

In that industry the FCA is trying to address  Guidance for firms on the fair treatment of vulnerable customers | FCA but its not easy stuff.

Ultimately it doesnt stop the selling of poor value products like high cost mobile phone tariffs but then what proportion of their customers are truly vulnerable and what percentage are just lazy? I know I fall into the second category. Plus where we do see regulatory action, such as the banning of price walking for Home and Motor insurance the regulators admit that they anticipate that the average new business policy will go up in price and so it will be positive news for those who's vulnerability may mean they lacked the capacity to shop around but will be negative impact on those who's vulnerability are financially driven as they must now pay more (a fact the FCA stated it accepted)

unholyangel

Are they being ripped off? There's no law governing that a price charged has to be reasonable, much less that it had to be as cheap as possible. I mean I think anyone buying an apple device is being ripped off, but plenty people buy and seem happy with the price. 

I'm not sure what your argument here is. Either they have capacity,  and therefore could have (if it mattered to them) spent the time researching. Or they didn't, in which case they can't enter a contract but should have someone who is in charge of their affairs (normally family member or support worker). 

Tip: help teach people how to get the best price rather than doing it for them. Because trust me, if it really mattered to them, they'd do the legwork. Just like you did it when your income dropped, because then it actually mattered to you.