Marshmallow Insurance - Fraud

gfriel2104

Hi folks,

My partner has recently applied for insurance through Marshmallow (as many of her years driving were from another country).

She was initially covered but informed, at around 8 hours notice, that her cover would be cancelled tonight. They have claimed that she made a false No Claims Discount, that they are charging her a £130 cancellation fee, and that they are reporting her to the industry fraud agencies.

I've looked at the documentation and verified that they all come from her previous insurers. She did do the initial quote on Compare The Market for 2 years NCD but found her most recent insurance to be just short, so only handed in documentation for 1. While his obviously would change the quote, its also clearly not fraud and also £130 cancellation if that is their issue.

Does anyone have any advice on how to move forward? Obviously the main things are the £130 and fraud register. Marshmallow doesnt have a customer contact line or email address.

MattMattMattUK

gfriel2104 said:

Hi folks,

My partner has recently applied for insurance through Marshmallow (as many of her years driving were from another country).

She was initially covered but informed, at around 8 hours notice, that her cover would be cancelled tonight. They have claimed that she made a false No Claims Discount, that they are charging her a £130 cancellation fee, and that they are reporting her to the industry fraud agencies.

I've looked at the documentation and verified that they all come from her previous insurers. She did do the initial quote on Compare The Market for 2 years NCD but found her most recent insurance to be just short, so only handed in documentation for 1. While his obviously would change the quote, its also clearly not fraud and also £130 cancellation if that is their issue.

Does anyone have any advice on how to move forward? Obviously the main things are the £130 and fraud register. Marshmallow doesnt have a customer contact line or email address.

Fraud by misrepresentation. 

gfriel2104

MattMattMattUK said:

gfriel2104 said:

Hi folks,

My partner has recently applied for insurance through Marshmallow (as many of her years driving were from another country).

She was initially covered but informed, at around 8 hours notice, that her cover would be cancelled tonight. They have claimed that she made a false No Claims Discount, that they are charging her a £130 cancellation fee, and that they are reporting her to the industry fraud agencies.

I've looked at the documentation and verified that they all come from her previous insurers. She did do the initial quote on Compare The Market for 2 years NCD but found her most recent insurance to be just short, so only handed in documentation for 1. While his obviously would change the quote, its also clearly not fraud and also £130 cancellation if that is their issue.

Does anyone have any advice on how to move forward? Obviously the main things are the £130 and fraud register. Marshmallow doesnt have a customer contact line or email address.

Fraud by misrepresentation. 

So if I go to Compare The Market right now and put in a quote to say I've been driving for 3 years but its actually 2 years and 11 months, and Ive never falsified any documentation to the contrary, I've committed fraud?

What if I misclick and say I was born a  year earlier than I was when filling out the form?

Obv not directing this at you, but that seems crazy as she was one month short of her second year and never made any statements after the third party quote. Surely that doesnt qualify for fraud?

400ixl

So she got a quote for insurance where she declared she had 2 years no claims from her previous insurance.

She then found that she actually only had one years NCD and submitted that. She didn't get it requoted for 1 years NCD?

What do you mean by her most recent insurance was just short? If she has 1 years NCD when she took out the policy and didn't claim on a full years policy she should have 2 years to use with the next insurer.

gfriel2104

400ixl said:

So she got a quote for insurance where she declared she had 2 years no claims from her previous insurance.

She then found that she actually only had one years NCD and submitted that. She didn't get it requoted for 1 years NCD?

What do you mean by her most recent insurance was just short? If she has 1 years NCD when she took out the policy and didn't claim on a full years policy she should have 2 years to use with the next insurer.

Actually I wasnt clear before, apologies. They specifically state;

"It has been established that there has been a breach of our policy terms. Specifically with

respect to the use of false documentation. It has been discovered that you have provided us

with a false NCD document."

I added the 2 years bit to say "Could it be that?" But after finding out she had only one year, thats all she submitted.

MattMattMattUK

Did she tell them that she only had one year's NCD after discovering that was the case, as it call them to tell them that was the case and they would need to requote the policy. Has she had any accidents in the last five years? 

Hoenir

gfriel2104 said:

 She did do the initial quote on Compare The Market for 2 years NCD but found her most recent insurance to be just short, so only handed in documentation for 1. 

Google Utmost Good Faith. A core principle of all insurance contracts. 

Insurers will naturally question how accurately the application form has been completed in all other regards. 

TSx

If I'm following right, 2 years were entered on the comparison site and only 1 year was on the document you submitted. I think that most insurers would see this as careless misrepresentation - and they are within their rights to cancel on the back of seeing someone submit incorrect details. It's probably better that this was found out now rather than when it came to claims stage.

It seems from what you've said though that they're actually alleging a document was altered - is the document that was submitted exactly what was provided by the previous insurer? This will have significant impacts on future insurance, potentially for life and in the short term being on the insurance fraud register is going to cause a lot of problems.

Your partner needs to make a formal complaint that the accusation is wrong and you have never altered documents but made a mistake when entering the details of the NCB. Marshmallow will have 8 weeks to investigate and provide a formal response and if you disagree you can take it to the financial ombudsman service. You should utilise this full process to try and get this corrected as soon as possible.