Motor Insurance forced cancellation scam

The request was refused by The Financial Conduct Authority.

Dear The Financial Conduct Authority, I feel that I have recently become the victim of a forced cancellation trick by a motor insurance broker. They get you to accept a really competitive quote on a comparison site, then they request so much additional information that it's almost impossible to get in the 14 day cooling off period. Once they have the information they use it to (in my case) treble the premium originally quoted forcing you to cancel the policy and then charging extortionate cancellation and "admin" fee's. I'd like to know if the FCA have had similar complaints about motor insurance companies that do this.

Yours faithfully,

Paul Howells

The Financial Conduct Authority

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The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is registered as a limited company in England and Wales No. 1920623. Registered office: 25 The North Colonnade, Canary Wharf, London E14 5HS, United Kingdom

The Payment Systems Regulator Limited is registered as a limited company in England and Wales No. 8970864. Registered office: 25 The North Colonnade, Canary Wharf, London E14 5HS, United Kingdom

Switchboard 020 7066 1000

Web Site http://www.fca.org.uk (FCA); http://www.psr.org.uk (the Payment Systems Regulator Limited)

Freedom of Information, The Financial Conduct Authority

1 Attachment

Our Ref: FOI5106

 

 

Dear Mr Howells

 

 

Freedom of Information: Right to know request

 

We refer to your request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the
“Act”), dated 16 April 2017, in which you asked:

 

“I feel that I have recently become the victim of a forced cancellation
trick by a motor insurance broker. They get you to accept a really
competitive quote on a comparison site, then they request so much
additional information that it's almost impossible to get in the 14 day
cooling off period.  Once they have the information they use it to [. . .]
treble the premium originally quoted forcing you to cancel the policy and
then charging extortionate cancellation and "admin" fee's. I'd like to
know if the FCA have had similar complaints about motor insurance
companies that do this”

 

Before considering your request I would like to inform you that the FCA as
an organisation does not process general complaints unless they are
complaints directly against the FCA and which meet the requirements of the
FCA’s complaints scheme, “Complaints against the regulators”.  Any
complainant or enquirer who expresses dissatisfaction in relation to firms
or individuals within the financial services sector generally is referred
to the Financial Ombudsman Service (“FOS”).  You may find it helpful to
visit the FOS website at [1]http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk for more
information.

 

Turning to your request, whilst it may be possible that we hold
information in regard to your request, to comply with your request would
exceed the cost limit. This is because there are a large number of
contacts received by our Consumer Contact Centre relating to motor
insurance companies. However, this data is not held in a readily
extractable format and, whilst we do hold a central record of such
contacts, without manually reviewing each record, we cannot say whether
any of them contain an expression of dissatisfaction relating to the
issues you have highlighted. To carry out this exercise would exceed the
cost limit provided for in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection
(Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004, therefore Section 12 (Cost
of compliance exceeds appropriate limit) of the Act applies. For a
detailed explanation as to why this exemption applies, please refer to the
Annex A.

 

Please note that in reaching the conclusion that your request exceeds the
appropriate cost limit, we have not considered whether any other
exemptions under the Act apply, but you should be aware that, given the
nature of the information you have requested, it is likely that they will.

 

 

Yours sincerely

 

 

Information Disclosure Team

 

 

Your right to complain under the FoI Act

 

If you are unhappy with the decision made in relation to your request, you
have the right to request an internal review.  If you wish to exercise
this right you should contact us within three months of the date of this
response.

 

If you are not content with the outcome of the internal review, you also
have a right of appeal to the Information Commissioner at Information
Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire SK9
5AF.  Telephone: 01625 545 700.  Website: [2]www.ico.org.uk

 

Annex A

 

·                Section 12 (Costs of compliance exceeds appropriate
limit)

 

The Act requires us to comply with a request, unless it would be too
expensive to do so, as estimated in accordance with the Freedom of
Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations
2004 (“the Regulations”) made by the Ministry of Justice.  The Regulations
provide that, for the FCA, the cost limit is £450, i.e. 18 hours at the
rate of £25 per person hour.  The Regulations allow us to take into
account, when estimating the cost of complying with a request, time spent
determining whether we hold the information requested, locating and
retrieving it and extracting the information from the relevant
document(s).

 

Since you have not provided a specific timeframe, we have carried out
comprehensive searches of our internal records for any contacts received
by our Consumer Contact Centre between the FCA’s creation on 1 April 2013
and 4 April 2017.

 

Our searches have resulted in the identification of over 31,000 entries
relating to contacts received in relation to ‘motor insurance companies’,
‘comparison websites’, or the ’14 day cooling off period’, all of which
may be relevant to the scope of your request. However, to determine which
of those records, if any, refer specifically to the ‘consumers’ concerns
you have described, we would need to manually check each individual
record. We conservatively estimate that it would take well in excess of 18
hours to undertake this exercise and therefore exceed the £450 limit.

 

As our policy is not to divert our resources from our regulatory functions
in order to meet requests under the Act in excess of the cost limit, we
will not carry out an exercise to identify the information you have
requested.

 

When we refuse a request because the appropriate limit has been exceeded,
it is our general policy to provide advice and assistance to the applicant
to indicate how the request could be refined or limited to come within the
cost limit. In this case, however, due to the large volume of information
that we hold, we are unable to provide such assistance, as any refinement
that we suggest is still likely to exceed the statutory time limit.

 

This communication and any attachments contain information which is
confidential and may be subject to legal privilege. It is for intended
recipients only. If you are not the intended recipient you must not copy,
distribute, publish, rely on or otherwise use it without our consent. Some
of our communications may contain confidential information which it could
be a criminal offence for you to disclose or use without authority. If you
have received this email in error please notify [email address]
immediately and delete the email from your computer. Further information
on the classification and handling of FCA information can be found on the
FCA website
(http://www.fca.org.uk/site-info/legal/fc...).

The FCA (or, if this email originates from the Payment Systems Regulator
Limited, the FCA on behalf of the Payment Systems Regulator Limited / the
Payment Systems Regulator Limited) reserves the right to monitor all email
communications for compliance with legal, regulatory and professional
standards.

This email is not intended to nor should it be taken to create any legal
relations or contractual relationships. This email has originated from the
Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), or the Payment Systems Regulator
Limited.

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is registered as a limited company
in England and Wales No. 1920623. Registered office: 25 The North
Colonnade, Canary Wharf, London E14 5HS, United Kingdom

The Payment Systems Regulator Limited is registered as a limited company
in England and Wales No. 8970864. Registered office: 25 The North
Colonnade, Canary Wharf, London E14 5HS, United Kingdom

Switchboard 020 7066 1000

Web Site http://www.fca.org.uk (FCA); http://www.psr.org.uk (the Payment
Systems Regulator Limited)

References

Visible links
1. http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/
2. http://www.ico.org.uk/