Barclaycard : Accidental Death Insurance

[TINK660]

Hi everyone,

 

I can vaguely remember a phone call from Barclaycard (must have been back in 2001 because that is when it was added to my account) about Accidental Death cover but obviously cant remember the conversation.

I believe that I was cajoled into buying it as I was unemployed (housewife) at the time and we had other insurances to cover us for this eventuality.

 

Anyway, on going through my paperwork in relation to ppi, I decided to cancel this insurance and phoned Barclaycard to do so. I was told that they couldnt cancel the insurance and that I would have to contact Stonebridge Insurance and given a telephone number to ring.

 

When I rang Stonebridge they informed me that I couldnt cancel the insurance as it was for my husband! and they would need a letter from him in order to cancel the insurance.

 

I want to reclaim the payments made already on this (they come to approx £500) I understand that it is not the same as PPI but does anyone know where I stand on this issue. I cant believe that I was making the payments out of my account but my husband had to cancel it - was sort of practice is that!

 

Funnily enough I have missed a few phone calls from Stonebridge who leave a message that they want to talk to me about an insurance offer but they dont leave a number and say they will call again. I suspect it is a sales call but I would like to be armed with some ammunition when they ring again!

 

Any advice greatly appreciated

 

Thanks

[alanalana]

Hi everyone,

 

I can vaguely remember a phone call from Barclaycard (must have been back in 2001 because that is when it was added to my account) about Accidental Death cover but obviously cant remember the conversation.

I believe that I was cajoled into buying it as I was unemployed (housewife) at the time and we had other insurances to cover us for this eventuality.

 

Anyway, on going through my paperwork in relation to ppi, I decided to cancel this insurance and phoned Barclaycard to do so. I was told that they couldnt cancel the insurance and that I would have to contact Stonebridge Insurance and given a telephone number to ring.

 

When I rang Stonebridge they informed me that I couldnt cancel the insurance as it was for my husband! and they would need a letter from him in order to cancel the insurance.

 

I want to reclaim the payments made already on this (they come to approx £500) I understand that it is not the same as PPI but does anyone know where I stand on this issue. I cant believe that I was making the payments out of my account but my husband had to cancel it - was sort of practice is that!

 

Funnily enough I have missed a few phone calls from Stonebridge who leave a message that they want to talk to me about an insurance offer but they dont leave a number and say they will call again. I suspect it is a sales call but I would like to be armed with some ammunition when they ring again!

 

Any advice greatly appreciated

 

Thanks

 

 

Tink I think this may be barclays sidestepping the issue and blaming Stonebridge. If you have original Agreements and they are on barclays headed paper then that is where to claim if the agreement is with stonebridge and they have signed a cca then that is the approach.

 

My guess is any agreement will be on barclays headed paper and stonebridge will be a broker arranging the Insurance and barclays will be charging you a fortune for an allegedly cheaper option from stonebridge.

 

SAR again on this issue get all the documentation you can before commencing battle.

 

aa

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__________________

[TINK660]

Well todays update day - I had completely forgotten about this one but have now written to Stonebridge asking for all my payments back. Lets see what happens with this one - not too sure about it because it is not ppi.

 

Tink

[alanalana]

Still with you on this one I may be slow but my mind is sort of consentrated

[questioner]

I also have discovered that accidental death cover has been on a BC policy for years.... what's the latest on this lot?

 

any success in getting it back?

[TINK660]

Hi all,

I made a complaint to Barclaycard because I believed I had been pressurised into buying Accidental Death Insurance over the phone, I purcahsed it 8 years ago and they persuaded me to buy it in my husbands name as I said I didnt want it. Barclaycard passed me to Stonebridge and they said that they had done nothing wrong. We cancelled the insurance in 2009 but they wouldnt let me cancel it, it had to be cancelled by my husband even though the premiums were being debited from my barclaycard. This matter was passed to the FOS who have just written saying that they uphold in Stonebridge's favour and that from a strictly legal viewpoint they have done nothing wrong in stating that my husband had to cancel it.

 

However I would like anyones opinion on this as I was never told at the beginning that I would be unable to cancel the insurance and if as they say it was a contract between them and my husband should they not have sent him forms to sign or spoken to him direct about this. Stonebridge are unable to supply details of the original phone call (surprise!) but have provided a copy of the recorded phone call in 2009 when I tried to unsuccessfully cancel the policy.

 

I intend to write back to the FOS with my concerns but would appreciate anyones point of view on this before I do, especially the legal aspect of the contract. They did not try to ascertain in the original phone call whether this insurance would have been suitable for my husbands requirements or whether he already had similar cover in place.

 

Comments much appreciated.

 

Thanks

[slick132]

Hi Tink,

 

There are 2 separate issues here.

 

Firstly, whether the policy was mis-sold in the first place. Has this issue been considered separately by the FOS, if you complained about mis-selling.

 

Secondly, if the premiums were being paid by you, you had every right to stop paying them. This would leave Stonebridge, who I assume were the insurers, to contact YH to arrange an alternative payment method.

 

To stop the payments, you only had to contact BC to instruct them. It would be no different to cancelling any other policy or contract that was paid from BC direct by a yearly or monthly SO or DD.

 

We cancelled the insurance in 2009 but they wouldnt let me cancel it, it had to be cancelled by my husband even though the premiums were being debited from my barclaycard.

Can you confirm exactly what you did or said to "cancel" the policy in 2009 and exactly what Stonebridge said to you in response.

 

8-)

[TINK660]

Hi Slick,

Thanks for replying, the FOS have considered the mis-selling and the other issue together and stated that they did not believe the policy was mis-sold because neither I nor Mr. Brown expressed dissatisfaction with the policy in the eight years that it was running.

 

As for me trying to cancel the policy, I first wrote to Barclaycard in December 2009 asking them to cancel the policy with immediate effect. I received no response from them so that is when I phoned them, and they put me through to Stonebridge who informed me that as I was not the policyholder I could not cancel or discuss the policy, they would need to speak to my husband who wasnt in at the time. Therefore he wrote them a letter to cancel it. Other than this letter my husband has had no communication with Stonebridge either by phone or by letter.

 

Thanks for your help Slick

[slick132]

Hi Tink,

 

Mis-selling

 

Unless you can show that the policy was invalid or inappropriate for any reason (eg YH was disqualified because of his occupation), you may struggle to take this further with the FOS. If you have a valid reason, you can ask for the case to be reviewed by an Ombudsman who is senior to an Adjudicator who would have made the initial ruling.

 

Cancelling payment

 

You probably had no right to cancel the insurance policy yourself. However, you had every right to cancel the premiums whenever you wished.

 

Did they continue to take premiums from your BC a/c after Dec'r 2009 and, if so, up until when.

 

What was the approx monthly premium.

 

8-)

[Cayman81]

Having been an employee of Stonebridge I am aware of the demographic model they target. Most of their partner businesses have housewives as clients i.e. Barclaycard, catalogues(Kays, Shop Direct), many banks and credit card companies)

 

Having listening to sales calls, the clients are often busy in the evening and half listen to calls. The sales caller doesn't explain to the customer the product in detail. I've heard calls where it's hard to tell that the product only covers accidental death. The sales caller only requires a 'yes' after the question, 'Are you ok to proceed?'. Hearing calls, it has been asked in a way that would not signify an important confirmation. The customer will start to be charged monthly.

 

You can cancel the product by contacting Stonebridge(not the business partner i.e. Barclays, Kays, Capital One) at any time.

 

The business relies on many customers not being organised and not looking at their statements. Is there anything that can be done...I'm not sure. After all the customer did say, 'Yes'. Is the FSA happy? Seems so...

 

It's a clever business in that relies on peoples flaws...as said before being unorganised and also fear.

Yes, fear is common in insurance. However, with this policy the payout only comes with Accidental Death(percentage of people who die from accidental death in the UK?...about 5%?)

 

The offer of huge numbers attracts people but big numbers are there for a reason...it's highly unlikely that it will happen.

 

Away from getting people onboard in a cunning way, one of their policies is underwritten to keep those payouts to a minimum.

 

Their Accident Cash Plan. It pays out relatively large sums in the UK and abroad, if due to an accident. BUT it only pays out if you're in hospital as a result of an accident and if you've been in for more than 24 hours. This important point is not made clear to ccustomers. In the UK, how many consultants would want patients to take up bed space.

 

Another Accident Cash plan pays out after 3 days in hospital.

 

I certainly feel sorry for all those people who have said, 'Yes', unaware of the product they have taken out or unaware of what they are still paying for.