It seems 1000's of people became dissatisfied withPru Health over the last year because Pru Health took away hard earned discounts at the same time as substantially increasing premiums. We had continuous (family) cover for 7 yearsusually with Gold (once Platinum) vitality discounts - which included"discounted" (to similar levels that any group discount would attractat Cannons / Nuffield) but not free gym membership. I accept that insurers have the right to tweak terms and conditions and / or increase premiums a little ahead of inflation andPRU consistently did both. I also accept that, with notice, this can includerevisions to No Claims and other discounts - like Vitality. However, I do not accept that it was within any reasonable definition of "Fair Trading" for PRU HEALTH to, in oneyear, do away with all my vitality and most of the value of my no claimsdiscounts. We have never made a claim of any kind yet ourmonthly premiums went through the roof! But the very worst thing was that 6 weeks before renewal I shopped around and got a written quote - on Pru Health paper - from abroker for identical family cover that was more than 40% less than my renewal quote. The Broker confirmed that this was not an introductory or reduced ratebut the full standard premium! I sent this through to PRU Health saying that theyneeded to explain why they want me to pay almost double and to either set myrenewal at the same level as their quote via the broker or stop charging me premiums and definitely not renew my policy the next month. Pru Health saidthey would look into this. I chased them for weeks and received only standard or evasive email replies until I realised they had renewed my policy at the inflated rate and were taking premiums from my bank account! After months of complaining, in frustration I wentto the Financial Ombudsman Service. This did produce a response from Pru Healthin which they said they would refund my premiums for health and Gym (I'd takenout my own Gym membership meantime) back to my renewal date. To date they appear to have refunded the health premiums but not the gym premiums, although in a call I made to them today they promised again to do this. The delay appears to be that they want me tosign a letter to say that it would be an end to the matter, which it would have been if not for a most unpleasant experience I had today. A Debt Collection Agency called Oriel Collections called me on my ex d number (which I hadn't given Pru) to try and collect the Pru health insurance premiums that Pru Health themselves had refunded to me as part of the FOS complaint!!!! I gave Oriel the full details including FOS refsetc. but they (a manager their) still refused to agree not to contact me again- in direct contravention of OFT Debt Collection rules. Now I no longer feel so incline to sign a letter letting Pru Health off and instead have looked into the matter again. It seems I'm just one of many to be treated unfairly by Pru Health. When I took out the policy I had a "reasonable expectation" that with normal business practices and normal insurance cost rises my policy would continue. But it seems that as soon as we were out of the 5 year moratorium period and had built up substantial no claims and Vitality discounts Pru Health were trying to force loyal existing policy holders to re-apply all over again and face years more of pre-existing moratoriums and building up no claims discounts, or pay almost double premiums! (47% more in our case for same cover, compared against newly underwritten policy). This is dishonest trading to my mind. If an insurer indicates you are paying the full premium at commercial rates, there is a reasonable expectation that, where no claims are made, the policy will continue, subject to minor changes to terms and inflation / slightly ahead of inflation increases in premium. To effectively double premiums to force loyal policy holders to give up no claims and other discounts, so that you can put them through re-underwriting and impose new claim moratoriums, just to increase your profits by forcing a de-risking of your existing client base, is immoral - and as far as I can see illegal. If lawyers on here can tell me it is technically legal under UK law, that may be one thing - But it certainly is unfair trading and the OFT should have issued a stop now notice and at the very least should be investigating the matter now. In the end, maybe it will take one of those claims companies, that can see the PPI project coming to a close, who will jump on this and get premiums back for Pru Health clients. Certainly, I would never have taken out a policy with Pru Health if I had known they would ever be allowed to get away with forcing existing policy holder to be fully re-underwritten every few years - defeats the point of having insurance, building up no claims discounts anda greeing to moratoriums on pre-existing conditions. Please, if anyone else has had any similar experiences add them to this forum.