Home insurance renewal rip-off by Direct Line; if you renew your policy you must be stupid, official. Friday 3rd July, 2009.
Posted by teahot in Complaint, Quibble.add a comment
Last year I went through a lengthy fuss over phone and internet to get various home insurance quotes after Direct line put up my insurance by around 100%. In the end they matched the “new customer” “internet only” offer and reduced my annual fee from £1,040 down to £528.
This year they really took the piss by trying to charge me an eye-watering £1,308, amounting to a 160% increase in premium. I phoned up their “customer care” who advised me that they could only offer a maximum of 40% discount unless I got an internet quote again first, after which they might match it. I was pretty annoyed with the irritation, waste of my time and the implicit corporate policy that their customers must be incredibly stupid to just renew without shopping around.
The Direct Line internet site quoted £865 (50% less than the renewal price, though it failed to save my quote and then promptly froze up giving a message of “technical difficulties” and telling me to try again later). Not too happy at this quote, I tried googling for comparison websites and plumped for moneysupermarket.com. Within minutes the Bank of Scotland had offered to cover my property for £272 for pretty much the same cover policy. So compared to Direct Line’s renewal offer, the lovely people at Bank of Scotland just saved me £1,036!
So what on earth is going on with Direct Line Insurance? Are they so hard up that they have to suck the life blood from every customer and confuse customer loyalty with customer gullibility?
CEO of Direct Line, LISTEN TO YOUR CUSTOMERS; I would have happily renewed my policy without blinking if you have offered me last year’s price plus, say, 6%. Now you’ve taken the piss by massively overcharging me, you have driven me to use your competitor. I’m really glad I don’t have shares in your company.
How British Gas avoid their legal obligations to refund for bad service Wednesday 25th February, 2009.
Posted by teahot in Complaint.1 comment so far
After listening to my Mother’s tale of woe in spending a fortnight endlessly waiting in for British Gas workmen to fit an electric meter, I was very interested in a recent BBC Watchdog programme where they explained that utility companies have a legal obligation to compensate customers for when they fail to attend a booked appointment. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/watchdog.
I found a customer service number for British Gas (using saynoto0870.com for a geographic number) and gave the basic information to my Mother to pursue. She had an annoying phonecall where customer services were unhelpful and defensive but eventually by quoting the law (The Electricity (Standards of Performance) Regulations 2005 and The Gas (Standards of Performance) Regulations 2002) they eventually offered legally defined compensation of £20 per visit. As they had managed to fail to arrive for 4 visits, this amounted to £80.
Doesn’t it seem sneaky that they don’t automatically offer customers compensation but only do this for customers that threaten to use legislation?
Warning, Budget / Avis will steal your pennies Friday 31st October, 2008.
Posted by teahot in Complaint, Quibble, Transport.add a comment
After checking my credit card balance today, I realized that rather than charging me the agreed £99 for van hire last weekend, Budget had actually charged me £100. When I phoned up the guy on the end of the line said that the rate was £99.99 (I distinctly remember originally being quoted £99 over the phone) and rounding up was “what they do”. Making me feel like some moaning tight-wad, he grudgingly offered to send me the 1p by post.
I’m left feeling a little “used” by Budget Car and Van Rental by their caveat emptor approach to selling, making it the customer’s problem to double check invoices and receipts (the Budget Rent a Car brand is licensed within Europe to Zodiac Europe Ltd, a subsidiary of Avis Europe Plc, Registered in England and Wales No. 4634240).
How odd to sell your products at £99 but then go through this customer unfriendly sharp practice of adding 99p and rounding up the quote without asking the customer first. Are they really so hard up compared to the rest of us that they need to lie about their pricing this way or do they just consider it a tip?
Update (20-Nov-08): Called today for the second time about their 1p overcharge. Quoted rental agreement. He claimed that the 1p was sent to me “a week ago” but could not give a date. Offered to send out another 1p by post. I stated that I would escalate the matter if it did not turn up within a week.
I was rather unhappy with this conversation so I called customer services of the parent company, Avis, on 0870 608 6363 (I actually used the “say no to 0870″ website to find a normal number to call) they referred me to the Budget customer services number, 01344668833.
This was the right number. It turns out that my rental agreement was through a franchise rather than direct (from his tone it sounded like this is the cause of many issues) and that £19.99 had already been credited on my credit card for “service issues” on 6/11 though this may take 10 working days to come through. I was rather surprised as at no point had anyone explained to me that they were crediting anything for my dissatisfaction. He suggested that if I could not see this credited on my account by Monday I should call back. Sounds like a result, I guess someone in Budget / Avis may have realized that they might have been breaking the law by rounding up prices between an invoice and the amount actually charged on a credit card, even if it is only 1p.
Update 2 (29-Nov-08): It’s now 6 days later than the guy suggested that my account would be credited. Tediously I’ll have to phone again during the working week to find out if he was mis-reading his own log and the £19.99 refund was just a mistake.
Update 3 (1-Dec-08): After calling again I was transferred to the local office (St. Katherine’s Way) where I overheard a conversation between two colleagues in reference to my call saying that “tell him to fuck off, we don’t owe him anything”. I was unimpressed and have made a formal complaint in writing to Budget Customer Services.
Update 4 (20-Dec-08): Finally resolved in a way that proves it’s worth following through on your complaints. I received an apology from Budget and a refund of £19.99 back on my credit card. Next time I book a car I’ll be taking extra care over the paperwork, what a pity you have to double check such things.
Junkmail from The AA Wednesday 22nd October, 2008.
Posted by teahot in Complaint, Junk Mail.Tags: Junk Mail
2 comments
I left The AA in 2004. Although I’m always careful to opt out of any marketing use of my details, since leaving they write to me every six months with joining up membership offers. Over the years I have phoned to complain (at least six times) and the last time I phoned I made notes of the conversation and the person involved assured me that I would get a response in writing.
I received no response and, predictably, six months further on I get another spam letter flagrantly misusing my customer records. I phoned again (wasting another 30 minutes of my time) but this time by calling twice managed to get a formal complaint reference number. In the process I found out that The AA had “opted in” ALL customers last year despite some of those customers having previously opted out, on the rationale that any customer who didn’t like it could complain!
A little research found that the Information Commissioner’s Office has an official PDF guideline document with a template letter so that you can send a legally recognised notice for a company to remove your records from their marketing database (see my Data Protection Act page). If they fail to do so within a reasonable time (the ICO recommends 28 days) you can either sue them for compensation or get the ICO to launch an investigation. So as well as having a formal complaint registered on their system, I have sent off a written notice. If I get another spam letter in six months time I’ll be able to get the ICO to investigate on my behalf. I’ll even do a little research into compensation, it may actually be worth the time taking them to court.
It’s a ruddy hassle but if more customers used the formal process I’m sure companies would stop misusing their data to make a quick buck.
The notice seemed to get their attention. I have received a letter by return on behalf of the Group Company Secretary (John Davies) assuring me that future marketing would be suppressed (within a 90 day period to go through their system, seems rather lax to me).
No written reply to my phone call so far, even with a registered complaint number. I guess “Customer Services” aren’t quite up to scratch compared to “Legal”.
