I am really confused with Hastings Direct Smartmiles. am 25, got my license 4 months ago and got myself a little car a couple of days later. A couple of issues I have had with them, Issue 1: Insured it with Hastings direct Smartmiles as it seemed to be a good policy and for a good price. Set up my appointment to have the blackbox fitted all fine. The night before the engineer was due to come in the morning and fit the blackbox (which was a couple of days before the end of the two week grace period due to my hectic work schedule) I got a call saying they wouldnt be turning up as the engineer had been taken ill, all fine and understandable so re-arranged it for a few days later. Again the night before I got another call saying the engineer would not be coming due to where I live. Hang on, they knew where I live when the original appointment was set up (and when I took out the insurance) how are they only just realising the engineer can't get here? Then told i would have to go to an authorised installer over 18 miles away to get it installed, annoying and so much for the installation being at my convenience. this was set for a weeks time, way past the grace period, which of course meant I was getting hounded by letters and calls threatening to cancel my insurance policy as I hadnt had the box installed. called them multiple times to explain the situation and confirm it wasnt my fault it was theirs and they promised not to cancel. Carried on getting the letters. the morning of the appointment i get a call from the installing garage asking me about my appointment as they had only just been told about it . I confirmed it and explained the situation to them and they were very short to me about it due to the short notice which was understandable. Got it done, then got home to put in a complaint to hastings re all the touble and threats id recieved they said they would investigate it. A few days later I get a letter from them saying the issue had been resovled and id be getting a £90 refund from the installation team due to my issues. great. Except I NEVER got it. Issue 2: Fast forward a few months and im involved in an accident (not serious) which i agreed liability to as Id been pulling out onto a main road , (the other person hadn't seen me pulling out and therefore hadn't slowed down). They got a small amount of damage (A smashed headlight and a dent in the bonnet), my car was written off. eventually when my car had been taken away and inspected by an engineer to confirm it was a write off, the engineer said I would recieve back the valuation of the car £1250 minus my excess which was £95. she asked me how I would want the money to be paid with me either bank transfer or cheque, I stated bank transfer please. Another week later (17/08/2016) i finally receive a text from hastings saying that my claim had been settled and I would recieve my payment within 7 days. Finally I thought, I can start looking for another car! Today (24/08/16) I called them during my lunch break to ask about my payment as I had not received it they said it had been authorised on the 19th. Got home and there was a cheque waiting for me. Funny bank transfer huh. Heres the good bit, the cheque was for £741, over £400 pounds less than I had been told! Straight onto the phone to them again to find out what had happened apparently as well as the excess they had also taken the £400+ as I pay monthly to pay the rest of my insurance for the year(which I hadnt been told would happen, just minus the excess), even though I had been previously told that my insurance had been suspended waiting for me to cancel it if i wanted. He explained that I had 30 days to add another car onto my policy (which I also hadnt been told). I informed him that I wasnt going to add another car onto my policy as I was thinking of getting a policy with the main arm of hastings when i got another car as i didnt want the black box anymore, and why have i been made to pay for the whole years insurance when Id only had it a few months and wasnt going to keep it anymore . Suddenly he was speechless and didnt know what to say anymore, then said maybe you should speak to the total loss team as they were handling it. He then put me on hold again for a while (about 5-10 mins) said they seem quite busy do you want to call back, i asked to be transferred. Another 5-10 mins later and someone picks up, i explain the previous conversation and she says i have not idea what to do about that the people you were speaking to deal with all that stuff, but its just gone past 6 pm so they cant speak to you any more about it today. She then even laughed a little and admitted it saying 'yeah probably' when i said 'oh thats just typical thats probably why they transferred me here then' Has anyone else had a similar experience or even heard of being made to pay for the whole years insurance when they dont even know if you will be keeping it any more. Im fed up with this company, safe to say they will never be getting any more business from me or my family again, I'd rather pay a bit more to someone else that have customer service like this! If anyone has had a similar experience or has any advice on what I could do I'd be very grateful!

hi I am writing on here because I am at my wits end. Hastings have done nothing but pass me from pillar to post, the have even told me lies ,which can be proved as they have told me they record all phone calls, unless that is yet another lie, this will be my second post today ,my first was to watchdog, hopefully someone can help me sort this out,i will also be looking to see where else I can post my experience.my son had a head on collision on the 6 sept it is now 21 sept,I will not mention any names etc,only the relevant information, the liability is still under dispute, however the accident investigator is confident we can prove my son was 100 % not at fault, any way the car was classed a total loss within a week, so the nationwide courtesy car was taken back, but was replaced with a car from Albany assistance which he is still using. This is a bit muddled up sorry, Hastings were on the verge of accepting 50/50 until I explained the photographs in detail, also my son has the black box fitted which records data, speed braking etc. etc,so after some digging around and numerous phone calls the decided to send the investigater.he is the only person we have spoken to that is interested in getting the truth.in the mean time Hastings say they will take my sons excess of 640 plus any remainder premiums on the policy from the cheque, that will leave him with around 50 to buy another car, but its ok according to Hastings because his insurance wlll be paid up to renewal date, no good when you haven't got a car to insure. so top and bottom of it ,you are only insured until you have a total loss then its your future premiums that are insured, so Hastings get my sons excessively high excess and his remainder premiums totalling around 2240 all in. then they will be able to claim all that back from the third party, so its a win win situation for them, they basically get paid twice if you have a total loss, even if you're not at fault. oh also forgot to mention we received a letter increasing his premiums by 200 a month, when I checked this they said his mileage had increased from 5000 to 10,000 for the year ,he has only been driving 3 months and the smart miles policy allows you up to 15,000 per year. I disputed this they told me it was an error and the premium was ok and would remain the same, that was a fri ,I then actually got a phone call Mon saying they had made a mistake and the underwriters needed to see the last 2 mot certificates to prove mileage even though he's only had the car as long as his license 3 months, I argued the case then emailed them the mots, eventually the amended it again back to the original premiums. I did ask who the underwriters were as I was so angry they lied to me ,I was told by 1 person that Hastings are the underwriters (I have taken their names as well) the when I asked someone else on a separate phone call I was told it was advantage ,so another lie or really poor customer service either way totally unacceptable. There is more to write and I have more paperwork that is utterly disgracefull,i want to warn every one about their customer service ,hopefully watchdog will be in touch with me to help me sort this out, like I said there is a lot more im just so tired of being lied to and mislead, my phone bills are horrendous,gonna have to leave it at that its making me angry the whole mess, its not even my sons fault ,he is not part of their statistics young drivers, his smart box has recorded him ads an excellent driver..........

I am very upset after reading the email from Hastings Direct Smartmiles, threatening to take £152 from my credit card and if I don't pay up, they will ruin my perfect credit history. I made the mistake of putting 8 years No Claim Bonus instead of 9 and the woman operative told me that according to the live rate this moment, I will have to pay £159.53 (£25 admin fee) on top of the £800 plus I paid last month (my son is 19). I was very shaken. I kept telling the woman that I did not inflate the figure with a view to lowering the premium. I made a genuine mistake of giving 8 years instead of 9 which is what I have. To any rational people, the common sense rule is that the more NCB years you have, the less you pay. The woman operative, a Ms Gill, kept saying that because of LIVE RATE, I actually had to pay more. Then she probably pretended to help me by running through my quote again and of course, according to her, I still have to pay. I googled the internet and found a similar amount being quoted by another person with a complaint on this site. It seems to be it is their practice to whack people with £152! My policy number : 22039TET0039072 The tone of the email is plain nasty. Please read Additional Premium £134.93 Your change caused your premium to increase Administration Fee £25.00 As stated in our Terms and Conditions Amount due £159.93 Please contact our Customer Service team. If we do not hear from you in the next 7 days we will collect this amount using your securely held card details. If we are unsuccessful your policy may be cancelled and the amount shown will be passed to a debt collection agency and your credit rating may be affected. ***** If I cancelled the policy, I would only get back £600! What a nasty company. They have no right to hit people with a genuine mistake like this - not to say I have ONE MORE YEAR OF NO CLAIM BONUS. The woman operative stuck to her gun saying that it is because of the LIVE RATE, she could not get me a lower quote! I hope anybody reading this take this as a lesson - I wish I had stayed with my previous insurer. Beware of this company. It is NO JOKE! It seems to be this company have a penchant of whacking people with £152! Would you like to deal with a nasty company like that??? Next time when you see the name, stay away or you will live to regret it!

Hi there. I appreciate this is a bit of a unique set of circumstances, if it was straight forward there'd be no need to post here, but I wanted some clarification and advice. I'll try and keep it simple. At 20 years old, I got my first car in October last year, Smartmiles was the cheapest insurance because of the box, however I still wanted to pay monthly due to my working circumstances and financial situation. In June, with only 2 payments to go, my direct debit bounced due to negligence on my part. I became aware of this, and went on to Creation's website (who manage my policy's finance) and paid the money that I was in arrears on there. Unbeknownst to me, paying through the website didn't stop the direct debit from being repeated a few days later, once again putting my account into "arrears" even though I actually only owed the final month, which shouldn't be due until the end of July. Then, due to the direct having bounced twice in a row, I apparently got hit with a £25 charge. However I was not told about said charge, and as such did not pay it. I got the usual letter from Hastings saying my policy would be cancelled in so many days due to my account being in arrears, however when this has happened previously I have called them, paid what I owe, and everything has been fine. Naturally, as I knew I had already paid for June's payment, and July wasn't due yet, I knew my account should not actually be in arrears anymore, and could disregard the letter. Except for the hidden £25 charge that had appeared. That ensured my account was still in arrears, and as such when I hadn't paid it by the 22nd July, my policy was cancelled. First phone call to Hastings, was told they'd ring back the next morning, I never had a phone call but they told me they could not get through to me. Fair enough. Second phone call, spoke to someone who basically told me that the £25 charge being unpaid was the reason my policy was cancelled, and they wouldn't reinstate it. Third phone call, spoke to a lovely lady, and she actually looked upon my situation, my finance account, transaction history, and saw that it was simply a case of computer automation, for example if I had phoned the company to pay, they would know it was paid before the 2nd direct debit went out, therefore I would have had no charge. Human intervention, in other words. She said she's going to have a look at it today, and call me back, which I appreciate, I shall see what she says and go from there. However I still want some advice. I completely understand that it is my responsibility to make sure my DD payments are going through. I get that. What I'm stumped about is being hit with a £25 charge, which I had no notification of, and cannot find any information about on Creation's website. If I had known that it was due, I would have paid it straight away and this would never have happened. As such now, with only 1 month's payment left (£155) I have lost the no claims of my first year, and, for the foreseeable future, whenever I try to get a new quote, I have to declare that I have had a policy cancelled, and so most insurers won't go near me, and the ones that do are easily charging north of £3000 for a 1.0 Saxo at 21 years old. Any advice? If this was a simple case of me missing a DD payment, and it being cancelled for that, I would accept it as my mistake, however the way I see it, it is not completely my fault at all. Thanks folks, apologies for being a bit long winded, it's just slightly complicated.