Hastings Direct - painful, degrading experience - DO NOT USE

[tobyjugg2]

Albany pay Hastings a commission of circa £400 if they refer a customer to Albany who uses a credit hire vehicle

Yes - not too clear there was I. Thankyou, I've seen the many references to amounts HD get selling their clients private information.

 

I was mostly referring to solid evidence of Albany claiming of 'no connection to HD', and the related issue of HD perhaps assuming a right of divulging your personal details and information to an external company which is NOT NECESSARY for their management of your agreement with them (HD).

Sounds to me like it might come under the using you information for 'purposes of marketing'.

 

I am not clear by any means what HD's responsibilities are regarding confidentiality of a customers information and divulging information to Albany, or any external company, without your express permission, let alone what HD ACTUALLY consider to be the case through interpretation of legal weasel words, particularly given Albany's apparent claim of 'no connection' to HD.

 

 

Update

Reading through the data protection bit of the HD blurb I have found no reference to Albany, but I have found the following:

 

"If prior consent has been received, we may market you with other products which we

believe may be of interest to you."

 

I haven't given any authority, nor would I. So if they ever gave my details to Albany without my specific and informed approval, I would fire off a complaint to the DP reg.

Edited February 18, 2015 by tobyjugg2

[AlbanyAssistance]

Hi Tobyjugg2,

 

If you'd like any clarification or assistance with any element of your claim with us, please feel free to get in touch on 0844 571 9280.

 

Alternatively, you can follow us on Twitter @AlbanyAssist where our online team will be able to answer any queries you may have.

 

Thank you,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

[caro]

Hi Tobyjugg2,

 

If you'd like any clarification or assistance with any element of your claim with us, please feel free to get in touch on 0844 571 9280.

 

Alternatively, you can follow us on Twitter @AlbanyAssist where our online team will be able to answer any queries you may have.

 

Thank you,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

 

 

Personally I think it's better to keep off the phone so you can keep a paper trail of developments should you need it if you don't get a satisfactory result.

 

 

Can't the online team respond on CAG AlbanyAssistance?

[tobyjugg2]

Hi Tobyjugg2,

 

If you'd like any clarification or assistance with any element of your claim with us, please feel free to get in touch on 0844 571 9280.

 

Alternatively, you can follow us on Twitter @AlbanyAssist where our online team will be able to answer any queries you may have.

 

Thank you,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

My entire point is that you should NOT ever have any information about me from Hastings without my express permission, and I would not willingly have any relationship whatsoever with a company with your reputation.

 

Or were you just trying to squeeze some income from your 0844 number, or generate some extra twitter followers?

 

While you are here please confirm under what circumstances and agreements Hastings divulges Hastings customers' confidential personal information to you, an external company?

[AlbanyAssistance]

Hi TobyJugg2,

 

I can confirm that this is not the case. We are simply here to understand what we can assist you with.

 

In relation to your last question, your data can be passed from your insurer to a 3rd party in order to provide services on their behalf. Details of this will be given in Hastings initial data disclosure statement.

 

If you would like someone from our customer service team to give you a full explanation regarding data disclosure, we can arrange this for you.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

[caro]

Hi TobyJugg2,

 

I can confirm that this is not the case. We are simply here to understand what we can assist you with.

 

In relation to your last question, your data can be passed from your insurer to a 3rd party in order to provide services on their behalf. Details of this will be given in Hastings initial data disclosure statement.

 

If you would like someone from our customer service team to give you a full explanation regarding data disclosure, we can arrange this for you.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

How about they post it here which may benefit others too?

[unclebulgaria67]

Hi TobyJugg2,

 

I can confirm that this is not the case. We are simply here to understand what we can assist you with.

 

In relation to your last question, your data can be passed from your insurer to a 3rd party in order to provide services on their behalf. Details of this will be given in Hastings initial data disclosure statement.

 

If you would like someone from our customer service team to give you a full explanation regarding data disclosure, we can arrange this for you.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

That is correct. ALL Insurance companies terms and condition will state exactly how data will be used. This includes passing on information to third party providers and also for things like fraud protection etc etc. Hastings will supply people with a copy of their t&c's, if they ask for it, as it is a standard document.

 

My experience is that often the problem with third party providers being involved with claims, is that neither the Insurers or third party company provide 'easy to understand' information, that informs the policyholder exactly what will happen. The claims staff tend to get stuck in dealing with their own processes and handling the volume of work they have to do. What they sometimes forget, is that there is a customer out there, who is wanting to know exactly what is happening, so they know what to expect and roughly when.

 

Also perhaps the Insurers claims department should be explaining the options available from the outset. There may be an attempt to push the customer is one direction, when the customer may not be happy. When I worked in motor claims years ago, we explained the options as clearly as we could and made sure the customer was happy. We did not push them. But times have changed and some Insurers claims departments don't offer a full claims service. If they have delegated their claims service to an outside company, they should say so at the point the policy is sold.

[tobyjugg2]

That is correct. ALL Insurance companies terms and condition will state exactly how data will be used. This includes passing on information to third party providers and also for things like fraud protection etc etc. .

 

It should not include generic "we will pass your data on to third parties", it usually does say something like we may notify you of other services you may be interested in from selected partners if you have notified us this is OK, they do and should include 'used for fraud prevention etc

 

Lets not forget Albany would seem to be saying that they have nothing to do with HD, yet HD would appear to be telling customers they have to use Albany.

There would perhaps seem to be some potentially regulation breaches there at the least.

 

My experience is that often the problem with third party providers being involved with claims, is that neither the Insurers or third party company provide 'easy to understand' information, that informs the policyholder exactly what will happen. The claims staff tend to get stuck in dealing with their own processes and handling the volume of work they have to do. What they sometimes forget, is that there is a customer out there, who is wanting to know exactly what is happening, so they know what to expect and roughly when.

 

Also perhaps the Insurers claims department should be explaining the options available from the outset. There may be an attempt to push the customer is one direction, when the customer may not be happy. When I worked in motor claims years ago, we explained the options as clearly as we could and made sure the customer was happy. We did not push them. But times have changed and some Insurers claims departments don't offer a full claims service. If they have delegated their claims service to an outside company, they should say so at the point the policy is sold.

 

Beware the difference between

approved 3rd parties eg approved repairers,

paid for insurance add-ons to policies,

and an insurer not just fobbing you off when they get away with it, but breaching data regulations and duties.

 

 

I still want to know what is Hastings official stance regarding

Official statement of their Relationship with Albany given the contradictory statements reported by customers

The disclosure of customer confidential data to an external company

 

I'm building up to an ICO complaint, or worse - trying to get it on a TV program.

[tobyjugg2]

Hi TobyJugg2,

 

 

In relation to your last question, your data can be passed from your insurer to a 3rd party in order to provide services on their behalf. Details of this will be given in Hastings initial data disclosure statement.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

 

So you do have a formal relationship with Hastings, rather than Hastings simply selling you their customers information, and you ARE a representative of Hastings despite your contacts first words to customers reported claiming you are nothing to do with Hastings?

[AlbanyAssistance]

So you do have a formal relationship with Hastings, and ARE a representative of them, despite your contacts first words to customers reported claiming you are nothing to do with Hastings?

 

We can confirm we do have a contractual relationship to provide services on behalf of Hastings Direct.

 

All calls are recorded for training purposes, so if you would like to speak to a member of our customer services team to check the call details from your original query, we are more than happy to look at this for you.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

[tobyjugg2]

We can confirm we do have a contractual relationship to provide services on behalf of Hastings Direct.

 

All calls are recorded for training purposes, so if you would like to speak to a member of our customer services team to check the call details from your original query, we are more than happy to look at this for you.

 

Many thanks,

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

 

 

Thank you for that response.

From reports here, it would appear that at least some of your contact representatives are misrepresenting your organisations relationship with Hastings on contacting Hastings customers. Are you addressing this issue?

Can you also confirm whether there is a choice in using you, or whether Hastings uses you exclusively in any circumstances?

 

And from Hastings (despite what they reportedly claimed in the first post in this thread)

http://www.hastingsdirect.com/car-insurance/accident-etiquette.html

Making a claim

 

The main priority is to settle the claim and repair the vehicle. If you were not at fault for the accident then your insurance company will try to retrieve the costs from those responsible. If that proves successful then your no claims discount will not be affected.

[AlbanyAssistance]

Thank you for that response.

From reports here, it would appear that at least some of your contact representatives are misrepresenting your organisations relationship with Hastings on contacting Hastings customers. Are you addressing this issue?

Can you also confirm whether there is a choice in using you, or whether Hastings uses you exclusively in any circumstances?

 

 

We are not aware of any issue relating to the disclosure of our relationship with Hastings through our contact centre. However, if you would like us to investigate your experience please contact our customer services team.

 

I'm afraid we cannot comment on behalf of Hastings Direct in relation to the range of contractual arrangements they have in place for policyholder services.

 

Albany Assistance Online Team

[tobyjugg2]

Thank you for those clear responses