Just a quick update, I sent the SAR off on Tuesday, next day signed for.

 

Before I did I phoned the insurance company to comfirm an address, and they said I had to wait 60 days to have anything returned to me, so I kindly reminded them of the regulations that clearly state 40 days.

 

The thing here is, should I also send a S.A.R to my phone company and email provider.... just in case?

I don't think your telephone provider would be able to list incoming calls, maybe voicemail records (not the voice recording but whether a message was left and its duration).

Email provider will be able to tell if you have had this email at one point in your inbox or junk folder and if you have deleted it.

I would be surprised if Microsoft or Google would entertain a sar.

Best record (or no record) should come from your insurance.

As said, I bet they'll claim that the crucial record have been misplaced.

I don't think they'll be so stupid to forge an email to cover up their incompetence considering that they know this will go to crown court.

Are you recording your calls? I suppose the answer is probably no you're not.

 

Call them again but this time record the call. Ask them about the deadline and see if you can get them to repeat once again that you will have to wait 60 days. If you can get this recording, it will be extremely useful. Come back here and tell us.

 

I don't think there's any point in sending SARs to anybody else.

 

Have you been reading up on ICOBS?

Suprisingly I did, I downloaded an app before calling them and it saved the phone call.

I will start reading up on ICOBS.

Thanks again

In that case well done - and pardon my cynicism!!

So you actually have the 60 days comment recorded? Did you tell them that this was against the law and that the real deadline was 40 days?

Yup, I said to him "but the regulations on that clearly say 40 days and that you would have to respond before then, not 60 days" he then responded by telling me that what ever the regulations are they'll comply with them. (he didn't repeat the 60 day comment a second time.)

Okay, the recording is not as useful as it might have been in that case.

Now just to double check, can you assure us completely that in fact you were fully qualified to drive that vehicle at the time? Meaning that you had all tests or documents or insurance et cetera in place, any learner signs, et cetera et cetera so that we can be absolutely certain that the only flaw was that a certificate had not been supplied to the insurer within the deadline.

You will have to swear to this in court.

Hey,

Not sure if I should be worried at this point, could be down to the Christmas/new years break, but I haven't heard a word back from the insurance company yet. No phone calls, emails or letters.

I've got the tracking number for the next day delivery, and it was signed for the following day.

Should I send them a reminder letter, as it has definitely passed 40 days.

Yes. You should send them a reminder letter. You should send it immediately. You should have sent it before.

I'm sorry to say but the way that you are popping in and out of this thread is not helping you. I see that UncleBulgaria suggested to you that you send an SAR right at the beginning of 2016 – a year ago and yet you did nothing. We were all on board to help you then and you let it go until eventually you were prosecuted by the police. Even in respect of this, you never came back to us because we could have suggested a way of defending yourself which would have avoided the problems of being convicted and then having to go for an appeal. You eventually send an SAR to the insurers but you haven't been on their case so that once again everything is getting out of hand.

Please can you remind us what date the appeal is.

Also, in my post above – number 59 – I asked you some questions just to double check your legal position at the time that this all happened. You never responded and frankly I would like you to do so please.

Hi BF,

I know it seems like I am popping in and out but if you read the old thread you would understand my situation was terrible after the accident and I simply chose to give up chasing it, I chalked it up to a life experience and moved on, it was either that or be homeless. I really had NO money left and was getting by on hand outs from friends. I just recently got my life back on track and flowing again and then BAAM came this prosecution for no-insurance.

Sorry for missing your old post, to answer your question, yes, every legal paperwork is in place and I have them with me all in one folder, including the CBT, the original CoMI for courier use, MOT, logbook - everything.

I just got of the phone with them and am emailing them now for an update, will keep you posted.

Thanks!

An interesting thing has come to my attention.

The email address they gave me to send an email to the data officer seemed to have already emailed me LAST MONTH, yet for some reason never showed up when I search my inbox as it ended up in the spam folder, flooded with black Friday/Christmas/new years offers.

The email says the following:

I am currently looking into your Subject Access Request.

 

Could you please confirm the reason for this request? I would like to deal with your request through our complaints process using the 40 day time frame to supply your requested of information.

 

I would appreciate it if you could get back to me as soon as possible in order for me to look into any possible resolution.

 

I look forward to hearing from you.

How should I go about responding to this? Does this mean they haven't processed the S.A.R? If so, does this mean they have broken the law in not doing so? I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been expected to respond to them anyway, a S.A request is a simple thing and they should have just proceeded it.

Were they asking for the reason for the request to clarify what data you were asking for, or was the data being requested clear?.

They can ask for the reason if the data you are asking for is unclear, in order to ensure you get the data you require. Otherwise, the SAR stands - you don't have to give a reason for a SAR if the data being asked for is clear.

Nope, what you see in the quote above is what is written in the email, nothing more. "Could you please confirm the reason for this request?" Why would I have to confirm anything? Anyway clearly they are now stalling or trying to take this another direction and to be honest I am not interested. A SAR is a SAR, and they should have complied.

Why dig up a letter I sent almost a year ago and start asking me to provide evidence NOW when originally they ignored everything I had written by responding with a generic response “we did nothing wrong, we followed all the rules” blah blah.

I'm sorry that you're having such a bad time of it – but we are trying our best to help you and once again you really have made things much worse for yourself by not dealing with this right at the beginning when we are helping you the first time.

I think you had better start checking your spam box and making sure that you are in control of the messages you receive. They are not entitled to ask this question or to impose any conditions. I think that it is about time that you started taking control of the situation – although you still haven't confirmed the date of the appeal as I asked you earlier. Please would you do this.

I suggest that you write a letter

Dear XXX

 

Reference XXXX

 

Thank you for your letter of the XXX date asking for the reasons as to why I have submitted a Subject Access Request to you. As it happens, your message went into a spam folder and I have only just discovered it. However, I am warning you that you are not entitled to ask this question or to make any conditions in respect of my SAR. The fact that you have now breached the 40 day deadline puts you in violation of your statutory duties under the Data Protection Act. Furthermore, your attempt to delay the disclosure or to impose conditions or to ask questions about it which have resulted in your breach of the 40 day statutory deadline, are also a breach of the Data Protection Act.

 

On the XXX date you peremptorily and unilaterally withdrew insurance cover from me and thus putting me in a position where I was prosecuted by the police for driving without insurance and found guilty. I'm sure that you must realise that under the Insurance: Conduct of Business Regs which were made by the FCA pursuant to the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, you have a statutory duty to treat me fairly. Included in those regulations are a requirement that you are not entitled to decline or to withdraw insurance simply because of some technical/administrative breach. Despite this, this is precisely what you have done and by so doing you have acted unlawfully and you should understand that I shall shortly be taking action against you.

 

Your deliberate delay and your failure to provide me with a statutory disclosure under the Data Protection Act is also an example of unfair treatment and so this is also in breach of the ICOBS requirements in addition to being breach of the Data Protection Act.

 

I am informing you that my conviction before the XXX magistrates for driving without insurance is now subject to an appeal before the Crown Court sitting at XXX on XXX date. I shall be providing the presiding judge with a copy of the ICOBS regulations and I shall be explaining to the judge how the offence with which I have been convicted only occurred because you acted unlawfully towards me by cancelling my insurance for a technical breach.

 

I fully expect that as a result of the allegations I shall make in open court, that my appeal will be successful and I also fully expect that the court will wish to make an order in respect of your company which may eventually require you to appear before it. This will be in addition to a civil legal action which I shall be bringing before the County Court once the whole matter has been dealt with in order to obtain a judgement against you and also compensation. My intention is that once I have the judgement, I shall be submitting it to the FCA and also a copy to the Information Commissioner as the basis for formal complaints.

 

I also intend to submit the results of my successful appeal to the Crown Court to the FCA as well.

 

I have tried to deal with you over this for a year. You have been completely uncooperative. I have now attempted to exercise my statutory right to full disclosure of my personal data and you have been completely obstructive.

 

You may like to know that the appeal date was originally set for November 2016. The court agreed to postpone that date upon my request until the day in February because I informed the court that I had supplied you with an SAR and that it would serve the interests of justice if the court was prepared to wait until the 40 day limit had expired and you had made your disclosure.

Your obstructive behaviour and your breach of your statutory obligations has now meant that the courts goodwill in postponing the appeal date has been wasted. You can be certain that all of this will be explained to the court. I suggest that you might want to pass this letter to your lawyers.

 

If you want to try mitigate your unlawful behaviour, you may well wish to let me have the statutory disclosure by return of post. There is not much time remaining. In any event, all of this will be brought to the attention of the Crown Court and also eventually to the County Court when I make my claim for compensation.

 

Yours sincerely

Also, – not for the first time – I suggest that you start keeping in closer contact with this thread

Thanks BF,

thats fantastic, everything I wanted to say plus some! I'll email them right away and tommorow send a copy recorded delivery just for good measure.

I thought I mentioned the appeal before in the thread, sorry if I didn't - originally it was set for the 30th of November but I requested the court to change this date to allow the S.A.R to come through as there was a 40 day window, so they changed it to the 2nd of February, stating that this date can not be changed. This is the crown court.

Thanks again.

In that case, please see my suggested amendment to the letter in red above

I added a line pointing out the realities of 6 points on my license causing my insurance premium to triple to over £2000 a year causing serious financial strain and hardship. Plus declaring insurance being cancelled added to this figure.

The fact that many people shy away from employing anyone with that many points, significantly reducing job opportunities/prospects. My main line of work at the time is/was in deliveries or sectors surrounding it. And the truth about this is I was recently refused jobs due to the points.

I would also contact the ceo and request that they contact the cps and explain that they had made a mistake in cancelling your insurance.

This might, and only might bring the case to a closure and get your licence clean again.

It all depends on them playing fairly or again hoping that you make empty threats.

They know they screwed up that's why they asked for a schedule of loss and are opening a complaint following the sar.

As other said, you should give utmost priority to this now otherwise you'll end up with a record that is gonna cost you dear for ever.

It does seem that the Insurers might be aware of an error, otherwise why would they have sent an email saying this.

"This was followed up with someone else asking me to provide them with proof of loss of earnings, impound fees, recovery, etc."

It is quite possible they have responded about the SAR asking about purpose, as they are not sure how to admit their mistake, as they will know of the prosecution for no insurance. There will be record on the policy about the Police having made contact and what they told them.

Well said!

I think their game is up.

The only thing you need to do now is to persevere and don't let the rope go.

I added a line pointing out the realities of 6 points on my license causing my insurance premium to triple to over £2000 a year causing serious financial strain and hardship. Plus declaring insurance being cancelled added to this figure.

 

The fact that many people shy away from employing anyone with that many points, significantly reducing job opportunities/prospects. My main line of work at the time is/was in deliveries or sectors surrounding it. And the truth about this is I was recently refused jobs due to the points.

I wish you wouldn't.

I would also contact the ceo and request that they contact the cps and explain that they had made a mistake in cancelling your insurance.

This might, and only might bring the case to a closure and get your licence clean again.

It all depends on them playing fairly or again hoping that you make empty threats.

They know they screwed up that's why they asked for a schedule of loss and are opening a complaint following the sar.

As other said, you should give utmost priority to this now otherwise you'll end up with a record that is gonna cost you dear for ever.

I think that it would be unhelpful to write any more than what I have suggested above. Things have moved on now and it is too late for all of this at the moment.

All of this kind of thing can be raised after the appeal when dealing with the insurance company in respect of their civil liability and the question of compensation.

I would think that maybe the ceo would do the right thing, contact the cps/court and get the conviction overturned.

Just to update here:

A Grounds of appeal/summary of position has been drafted and sent to the Snaresbrook Crown Court where the appeal is listed to be heard on 3 February. A copy has also been sent to the CPS who have acknowledged receipt.

A copy has also been sent to the insurer who have remained silent. They are also in breach of their DPA obligations to make a statutory disclosure within 40 days.

The grounds of appeal are basically that the insurer acted unlawfully contrary to ICOBS in cancelling the insurance on a technicality and therefore the cancellation is void and the insurance was in place.

On the question of whether the OP was notified, we have said that we are unable to produce evidence because the insurer is not honouring their DPA obligations, but in any event whether or not a notification happened, it does not affect the illegality of the cancellation and therefore there cancellation is still void the insurance is in place.

In my view these are winning arguments. The only problem is that they were not put forward at the time that the original grounds of appeal were filed and so technically, we are out of time to file this grounds. We will have to see whether the CPS objects and what the court says.

If the appeal is successful then it is highly likely that there will be a County Court action under ICOBS against the insurer. If the appeal is successful, then it is almost 100% certain that an ICOBS County Court action against the insurer will succeed as well.

That's the plan…

what strange thing is ever since I did my first cbt I never been asked proof and even when I had a accident on 1st year that wasn't my fault they never asked for it and 4years now they never asked for my cbt proof I'm with Swinton

theres seem to be a lot of companys not telling the buyers about providing proof of cbt and then cancelling

Hey guys, just to follow up on all of this

Thanks to BF, who has been of great assistance on and offline in helping prepare all of the documents and guiding them to all the correct departments, if it wasn’t for him, I’d be completly lost, so for this I will be forever indebted to him and the CAG.

A few updates since the last post:

The insurance company finally replied to me with a vague covering letter, once again asking for my losses blah blah. In the same letter they have openly admitted to failing to provide the SAR request and even made a lovely gesture in returning my £10 (more of an insult then anything, but anyway.)

According to them, they will not be sending me a copy of the email they allegedly sent me informing me of the cancellation, as this is not listed in the documents they will include in my request.

Up until this point they haven’t denied fault, which is all very interesting. I don’t think they'd have a leg to stand on even if they tried at this point, as it is becoming very evident that the cancellation was illegal, full stop.

Their letter, along with my reply to them was forwarded to the CPS via email. A hard copy will be sent recorded delivery to the Crown Court.

I did receive an email earlier from the CPS, acknowledging they received my grounds of appeal and all supporting documents (ICOBS and the FSMA) and that they are looking into it and will get back to me after they have reviewed it. This is at least some what promising.

I will keep you guys posted as this unfortunate story unfolds.

Thanks again to everyone

what strange thing is ever since I did my first cbt I never been asked proof and even when I had a accident on 1st year that wasn't my fault they never asked for it and 4years now they never asked for my cbt proof I'm with Swinton

 

theres seem to be a lot of companys not telling the buyers about providing proof of cbt and then cancelling

That would mean that it varies from company to company then.

The interesting thing here is,

would anything any insurance company request and not receive, fall into the same category?

I know of a friend who had his car insurance cancelled many years ago because he failed to send them a copy of his No Claims Bonuses,

the reason being,

his previous insurer did not send them to him,

and he never bothered chasing it up.

The grateful thing here however was that he WAS notified and given a 30 day notice in a letter sent by his company, via recorded delivery.

how many unfortunate souls are out there right now with probably 6 points or more on their licenses because of this mistake in the insurance industry I wonder?

A couple of points.

It is strange this Insurance company cannot provide anything in regard to the cancellation email sent, as even if they could not reproduce the actual email, they would still have the data record of the email being produced and being sent via their servers. Given that Insurance is a legal requirement, they must have robust systems in place to ensure cancellation notifications are actually sent.

In regard to whether an Insurers can cancel a policy due to non receipt of CBT information, this is a tricky one. If they won't insure anyone without a CBT, they could arguably cancel because they are unwilling to cover someone against third party risks, who has not met the standard required set by legislation. Some Insurers might include it is their assumptions for cover that the Policyholder does have a CBT so they are fully legal to ride on public roads. In the event of an accident, if it turned out their was no CBT, the Policyholder could have the policy made void and be pursued by the Insurers for any claim payout to a third party. Bankfodder is correct that Insurance was cancelled due to a technicality and it is up to Insurers to prove they have a robust system in place to ensure policyholders know about cancellation procedure. I.e they need to highlight on website important note regarding CBT, so people know how important this is and in the letter sending the policy it needs to be made very clear. Then if the policy is to be cancelled, they must ensure the policyholder does get advance notification.

Here's a teaser:

There's been an extremely interesting development in this case which we will announce in the next two or three days – so stand by.

We will put up some correspondence in the next few days, but the insurers were written to last week and threatened and urged to consider their position and to provide some documentation to the Crown Court sitting on appeal that the insurance was in fact in place.

This seems to have worked. The correspondence has finally managed to find its way to the compliance officer who presumably is somebody with a little bit more savvy and a bit more of a sense of responsibility and probably more aware of the necessity for reputational management and the drones. An email was received today asking for a few further particulars and with the promise to provide a letter of indemnity. The letter of indemnity has now been produced which shows that the OP was in fact ensured that the time of the accident.

Clearly the insurer is being evasive. The insurer statement is very bland and refers only to the day of the accident. However, we think it should suffice to persuade the court that there is sufficient doubt to quash the conviction.

After that, we will begin an action against the insurer which will disclose everything and hopefully it will eventually raise issues as to how many others of their clients have also had their insurance policies peremptorily cancelled with consequential risk to the innocent victims of accidents.