Complaint AA Breakdown Renewal without notification

CazCAB

I am having enormous problems with The AA for the same reason- in January they took over £140 from my account without notifying me beforehand - I have now contacted them twice on the phone and both times they said they would fully refund my money- that was 5 weeks ago in the first instance, and 3 weeks ago in the second instance, and there's no sign of the money in my account.
I have now sent them two e-mails (one to the customer care line as given by an AA employee on this board) and had no reply whatsoever. I'll be contacting BBC Watchdog about this as it is totally unacceptable. It is a significant amount of money to me (over £140) and I'm having to use my credit card to buy daily essentials, therefore getting into debt because they aren't refunding my money.
I didn't receive a renewal letter from them until about a week after they took my money, so there was no way I could have got my bank to prevent the charge.
I cannot believe a company could act so irresponsibly. I will DEFINITELY not be using them again! Why isn't there a law to prevent these extortionate automatic renewals which take your money without informing you and then don't refund it!?
If I don't get a response by Monday I'll be contacting the small claims court, as I'll have no other option. So stressful!!

skiddlydiddly

Is there any way people can notify their banks/cc in advance to not allow this transaction to go through?Maybe providing their bank with a copy of a letter sent to the AA categoricly stating you do no twant to renew?

jcb208

Just had my renewal through way to expensive so they wont be getting my buisness this year.As a new customer its about £40 cheaper ,I hope when I cancel they do not still take the money from my account,I dont know where the AA's loyalty is they should be trying to keep existing customers with incentives

alastairq

I believe the AA [no longer the motorists' friend they used to be..that's private enterprise for you]....is taking too much of an advantage in their use of 'customer inertia'.

..they hope they can get away with the inflated prices...when challenged, they usually fall back on the discounts......but obviously, many customers don't even realise or care about the renewal increases....and simply allow the AA to get away with it.

jcb208

Any one know a number I can use to get in contact with them as I want to cancel my cover and have twice now been on hold on the phone for 20 mins and am loosing my patience with them,am using 0800 435 980

NeverAgain_2

My AA renewal was £208, after last year's special offer of about £50.

I spoke to them on the phone, and after tinkering with the cover they dropped the price to £100.

Still too much, and I don't like the way they attempt to rip off existing customers, so I cancelled.

I emailed confirmation of cancellation to the customer services email address on the website.

They replied confirming cover has been cancelled.

So I'm hopeful that has been done.

Looking around, breakdown, relay and home start is available from other providers for around £50, so I see no reason to deal with the AA.

sirmarcus

For anyone affected by the AA's incomptence....Try escalating and/or complaining to Andrew Goodsell, SAGA/Automobile Association (AA) Chief Executive, via sending him an email to [EMAIL="Andrew.Goodsell@saga.co.uk"]Andrew.Goodsell@saga.co.uk[/EMAIL].

Ishtar

I have been a customer of the AA for around 15 years - last year they sent my renewal through and wanted something daft like £197 for me to continue (I have a joint policy, any vehicle)...I gave them a call to tell them I was cancelling as I could get the same cover everywhere I looked for much less (even from them as a new customer).

Surprise, surprise, because I am a "loyal customer and had been with them for so long" there were some discounts they could apply - which knocked almost £70 from the cost, making them very competitive, so I stayed with them. I've never had any other problem with them.

If I were that important, why couldn't the discounts have been applied before sending my renewal through?

pob

I've been trying to get though to cancel for ever since I got my renewal letter.

Every time I call the 0800 435 980 I get, "all our operators are busy dealing with a high volume of emergency calls, please call later" and then it hangs up on me

Can you cancel using the Customer Relations number?

mikey72

We had to.
Even then they tried to transfer us onto the cancellations line, and we had to refuse to let them.