In May this year my wife's sister-in-law asked if she could use our computer to search for a comparison site for car insurance. To make a long story short, I'll cut to the chase and answer any questions later, I won't mention the insurer unless the Mods ask me. She got a satisfactory quote, filled in the proposal form and remitted the full amount for 12 months insurance. She received, via email to my address, a Certificate of Insurance citing insurance from June 2013 until June 2014. Last week she received a letter from DVLA stating that no valid insurance for her vehicle appeared on their database. I contacted the insurer via email, and was told that two emails had been sent to the email address she had provided, (mine), asking for proof of NCD, when no replies were received they cancelled the insurance. In their email they quoted the email address that they had on record, it was close to mine, but minus one letter. It materialised that they had credited the premium paid back to the sister-in- law, minus a reasonable amount for the cover they had provided until cancellation, and taken a £53 admin fee. I pointed out that I was receiving their emails because they were replying to ones I had sent, which emanated from my computer, so how could they have a wrong address in their system? Plus, if I had given them a wrong address, how did they send the Certificate of Insurance to the correct one? I also asked how could they just let her drive for 4.5 months uninsured, when they had her address, and both her land line and mobile numbers to inform her of the situation? They replied that they were an on line only company and did not send snail mail or phone customers. She is not unduly bothered about the admin fee, but for 4.5 months she was driving completely unprotected, as were anyone that might have had an accident with her, fortunately she had no accidents. The police were never involved, she has no prosecution pending, and is now insured with another company, but both she and I want to apprise the public about this in order that they can avoid it happening to them.