John Lewis Cancelled my Car Insurane when they made the mistake!

[Robbda]

Hi all

 

I wanted some advice please.

 

I bought Car Insurance with John Lewis in Dec '12 and arranged to pay by Direct Debit.

 

In January the DD failed, I recieved a letter saying the bank had told them it had been cancelled so I called paid over the phone and reset the DD.

 

In Feb the DD failed, I called, and it was suggested that the issue was possibly due to the fact that I have another DD to john lewis on the same date and that was the confusion, I was told to wait, see what happened with the march payment and go from there.

 

In march the DD failed, as the DD date was a weekend I didn't intend to chase the issue until a week had passed as sometimes they payment can be delayed a few days, however 5 days after the DD date I received two letters from John Lewis on the same day, 1 to say the payment had failed and I needed to pay or they would cancel my policy and the 2nd to say - "we cancelled your policy 5 days ago please pay us £135"

 

I called straight away to sort out the problem, and to be honest the woman was really off with me until I broke down (I was hit by a lorry last year and the thought of that happening while id been driving around unbeknown to me uninsured got me in a right state)

 

I paid all the cancellation charges, and purchased a new policy (the price had now increased)

 

I logged a complaint with my bank as I hadn't cancelled these direct debits but each time I was told that the bank had said I had. After a month of investigation it turns out that John Lewis set the mandate up in December for the first payment in March! so each time they asked for payment my bank said no

 

I'm fuming, I suffered PTSD after the accident last year and to be honest I was pretty histerical after my call with John Lewis that night, fortunatley I always insure fully comp and i've had a year of medical treatments that I couldn't have afforded, and still have £4k worth of pescription bills and loss of earnings that I'm trying to claim back to think I could have had an accident that week and not been insured doesn't even bare thinking about.

 

I'm just writing a letter of complaint and I wondered if you think I am being reasonable with the following request:

 

• A refund for the £135 the charged me for the cancelled policy (admin fee & legal for the full year!)
  
• A refund of the additional £24 this year I'm having to pay on the new policy I had to purchase because they cancelled the original policy
  
• A letter confirming that a "cancelled Policy" was down to their incompetance (I've had to declare it to all my other insurance companies)
  
• Compensation for the fact that they wrote to tell me my policy had been cancelled and sent it 2nd class meaning I recieved it 5 days after they had cancelled and was driving round uninsured, invalidating my tax disc and breaking the law despite them having my email address (which they send the policy to) and my telephone number
  
• Compensation for the inconvience of regular calls with Santander to get updates on their investigation, ringing round all my insures with the embarrasment of telling them I have a cancelled policy on my records and to be honest the state it got me into that night my parents had to come sit with me and i'm 33! so embarrasing
  

Also (sorry!) does anyone know if they can retract the "cancelled policy" note? as I'm going to have to declare that for 5 years

 

Thanks for reading!

[rebel11]

Hi Robbda

 

Welcome to CAG

 

Write a Formal Letter of Complaint, mark it as such. Explain what's happened, how they have let you down and what you want them to do. If it was cancelled in error then, they should be able too.

 

Send it to:-

 

Mr Andy Street

John Lewis

Managing Director

[email protected]

 

If it isn't resolved to your satisfaction, then once you can get a final response you can take the matter to the FOS.

[Robbda]

Thanks Rebel11

 

I will do that and report back so up set by the whole thing x

[unclebulgaria67]

There is no central record for a policy cancelled due to a payment issue. Insurers ask for all cancellations to be disclosed, so they can understand the issue. It would not prevent an Insurers from quoting and providing you with a policy.

 

I don't understand the Direct Debit issue and why John Lewis Insurers would have said that the first payment would be collected in March. I was not aware that when a company registered a DD with a bank, that there was any indication to the bank of when the first payment would be collected. The DD authority will not normally allow a payment within the first 10 days, as there has to be atleast 10 days notice of a DD payment.

 

Anyway, the DD was not set up properly and this is not your problem. It is either John Lewis or Santander at fault. I am suspecting that John Lewis Insurers will point the blame at Santander.

 

You should be aware that John Lewis don't adminster the Insurance. It will be the Insurers that they use who do the admin and therefore any letter to John Lewis will be passed to the Insurers to deal with. The Insurers just use John Lewis stationary to reflect the brand of the product you bought.

 

Send the complaint as advised and see how they reply. You won't get all the £135 refunded, because part of that is likely to be for time on risk. If they blame Santander, you may just get some compensation, as a gesture of good will.

[BankFodder]

This is about only the second or third complaint we have ever had about John Lewis in 8 years. Of course it relates to a financial product which in a way is out of their control - nut not out of their responsibility.

John Lewis are generally very good to deal with if you can get through to the right person.

 

All of your demands seem reasonable enough to me and don't forget that cancellation fees must reflect actual admin costs and they don't appear to do so here.

Although this is only JL branded, they bear all the normal responsibilities. In other words they can't take the gain but not the blame. They are bound to treat you fairly and it would be unfair for them to try and shift responsibility. I think that you should do everything you can to keep the focus on them and to refuse to be bumped off to some other people. John Lewis will be bound by all the usual rules including ICOBS.

[BankFodder]

By the way, if you have a twitter account, then retweet our tweet about your case to John Lewis. They may respond

 

@johnlewisretail

[ssett]

Isn't there also the issue that you now have to inform any insurance companies

'have you had any insurance policy cancelled or declined' ?

[unclebulgaria67]

Isn't there also the issue that you now have to inform any insurance companies

'have you had any insurance policy cancelled or declined' ?

 

Yes they have mentioned this. Insurers mean cancelllations where there has been an issue of non disclosure, fraud, too many claims. But they ask a generic question so that people disclose all types of cancellation.

[dacouc]

Yes they have mentioned this. Insurers mean cancelllations where there has been an issue of non disclosure, fraud, too many claims. But they ask a generic question so that people disclose all types of cancellation.

 

Axa will not generally accept a customer who have had a policy cancelled due to non payment, they specifically state it.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Many insurers have the same clause all due to the misuse of the instalment plans being paid at first but once a certificate is issued payments are stopped often this has been done

many times by individuals so it had to be addressed.

[Robbda]

Thanks Everyone.

 

I called and logged my complaint and they have asked for confirmation from my bank in writing that it was down to John Lewis setting up the mandate in correctly so I will wait and send in a proper letter with that attached... cheeky so and so's then sent me a customer service satisfaction survey on the new policy purchase 3 hours later! I nearly spontaniously combusted!!!

[unclebulgaria67]

Thanks Everyone.

 

I called and logged my complaint and they have asked for confirmation from my bank in writing that it was down to John Lewis setting up the mandate in correctly so I will wait and send in a proper letter with that attached... cheeky so and so's then sent me a customer service satisfaction survey on the new policy purchase 3 hours later! I nearly spontaniously combusted!!!

 

I cannot recall seeing a start date on a Direct Debit Authority that had been set up electronically. Something is a little odd, but John Lewis Insurers will have a record of what communications they have had with your bank, so they can work out what happened.

 

I would not be surprised if you had difficulty in getting the letter from Santander stating what they told you previously.

[Robbda]

Actually I have to say Santander have been fab and agreed to send a letter out yesterday, they even compensated for the time it took them to get to the bottom of issue dispite it not seemlingly being their fault..so you never know!

[unclebulgaria67]

Actually I have to say Santander have been fab and agreed to send a letter out yesterday, they even compensated for the time it took them to get to the bottom of issue dispite it not seemlingly being their fault..so you never know!

 

Perhaps Santander have improved. My only experiences with them are that they are difficult to deal with, with requests having to be made on several occasions.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

I cannot recall seeing a start date on a Direct Debit Authority that had been set up electronically. Something is a little odd, but John Lewis Insurers will have a record of what communications they have had with your bank, so they can work out what happened.

 

I would not be surprised if you had difficulty in getting the letter from Santander stating what they told you previously.

Sounds like a miracle rather than just " improvement" from Santander!!

[Robbda]

hey

 

quick up date - Santander sent me the letter which I forwarded to John Lewis.

 

John Lewis promptly called me clearly having not read the letter nor notes from my complaint and said its a direct debit issue nothing to do with us go back to your bank...

 

now i'm angry... I explain to the customer service representative that my bank have fully investigated and as stated in their letter their findings are that the fault lies with John Lewis and that I do not believe they have looked into the matter properly as satander investigated for over a month. The lady then said it was probably the bank taking an old DD reference for an old policy... wrong again i've never been with John lewis.. so she decides to call me back...

 

She calls me back shes spent a couple of hours with accounts - there is nothing wrong with the direct debit... I asked if she had pulled up the original mandate.. silence... she states the bank confirmed the direct debit details with John Lewis when it was submitted.. so I asked if she was suggesting Santander was lying.... Silence... she can only apparently relay what accounts had told her (interesting I thought she spent time WITH them so would have seen for herelf)

 

As a gesture of goodwill I can have the cancellation admin fee back and the legal fees I was charged for the cancelled policy.

 

I've declined it. I said that I didn't believe knowing full well that I was sending their letter to John Lewis that the guy from santander would lie and put his signature on the letter. I asked if that was their final response and if she would put that in writing so I could raise it to the ombudsman - she said she would log a formal complaint for me (er... i did that 3 weeks ago so thats not been done properly either) and said she would escalate my complaint and get it looked into (??!!) - that was a week ago and I haven't had a single update

 

So I have written to the CEO. they have 5 weeks to respond..

[rebel11]

Thanks for the update, let us know once the MD responds.

[unclebulgaria67]

I did warn you that you would probably end up with John Lewis Insurers blaming Santander and vice versa.

 

My money is still on Santander being at fault, even if they have stated they are not in some letter. The DD info that Insurers send banks is straightforward and you dont normally have a problem. It is usually a problem with the banks system, when things go wrong. That is my experience anyway.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

hey

 

quick up date - Santander sent me the letter which I forwarded to John Lewis.

 

John Lewis promptly called me clearly having not read the letter nor notes from my complaint and said its a direct debit issue nothing to do with us go back to your bank...

 

now i'm angry... I explain to the customer service representative that my bank have fully investigated and as stated in their letter their findings are that the fault lies with John Lewis and that I do not believe they have looked into the matter properly as satander investigated for over a month. The lady then said it was probably the bank taking an old DD reference for an old policy... wrong again i've never been with John lewis.. so she decides to call me back...

 

She calls me back shes spent a couple of hours with accounts - there is nothing wrong with the direct debit... I asked if she had pulled up the original mandate.. silence... she states the bank confirmed the direct debit details with John Lewis when it was submitted.. so I asked if she was suggesting Santander was lying.... Silence... she can only apparently relay what accounts had told her (interesting I thought she spent time WITH them so would have seen for herelf)

 

As a gesture of goodwill I can have the cancellation admin fee back and the legal fees I was charged for the cancelled policy.

 

I've declined it. I said that I didn't believe knowing full well that I was sending their letter to John Lewis that the guy from santander would lie and put his signature on the letter. I asked if that was their final response and if she would put that in writing so I could raise it to the ombudsman - she said she would log a formal complaint for me (er... i did that 3 weeks ago so thats not been done properly either) and said she would escalate my complaint and get it looked into (??!!) - that was a week ago and I haven't had a single update

 

So I have written to the CEO. they have 5 weeks to respond..

 

 

 

 

If you have made a "formal complaint" they have 8 weeks (56 days) to respond.

[Robbda]

thanks, yeah i'm taking into account my formal complaint lodged 3 weeks ago

[unclebulgaria67]

thanks, yeah i'm taking into account my formal complaint lodged 3 weeks ago

 

Unless you work for Santander and have total belief in the accuracy of what they have told you, I would suggest that you ask Santander to provide a copy of the data relating to this John Lewis DD going back to when it was first sent to Santander in December 2013. There will be records of what has been processed against this DD and if payments have not gone through, why they did not do so.

 

The other possibility which I have just thought of, is that when John Lewis originally set up the DD, they made a mistake keying in the sort code or account number. But you would have checked that with John Lewis already, so probably not.

[Robbda]

Thanks, good idea i will do that now

[Robbda]

Hi all

 

Quick update.

 

I got a full and final response from John Lewis.. I can't believe their stupidity..

 

firstly they write its santanders fault my first repayment wasn't due until (and note 18th Feb 2014) and they were refused due to payee cancelling the direct debit they have enclosed two letters they say they sent me - one telling me my JANUARY 18th Direct debit had failed - I needed to pay ASAP or they would cancel my insurance...

 

1. why they chasing payment for a January payment if I was meant to pay til Feb and 2. never got this letter

 

and the second letter is totally different to the one I got in feb asking me to pay - and unfortunaltey for them I still have it...

 

they also sent me a screen shot of their system showing they applied for payment in January (even tho i wasn't meant to start paying til feb) and February however, having worked with similar systems for many years I was interested to see that the computer had logged my DD cancelling in january lower case - this normally only happens on our bank systems if the data has been manually input the following series are all in capitals which is the norm when two systems speak to each other...

 

they then refunded the money for the previous offer (£50) that i declined back to my bank account (they they couldn't access apparently) without my permission or acceptance of the offer..

 

so i've sent it all to the ombudsman.