This is Part 3 of a 3 part series regarding reclaiming Payment Protection Insurance. Part 1 examined the history behind PPI, the reasons for mis-selling and common reasons you may have a claim, and Part 2 covered a reclaim success story. This part details exactly how to go about reclaiming, and where further help can be obtained.

The most important message I can impart is you can do this all for free, and quite easily. Don’t hand 30% upwards to a claims handler just for having to spent 20 minutes writing a letter and walking to a postbox!

The banks have lost in court regarding systemic, decade-long mis-selling of Payment Protection Insurance and you may well be due a refund. Millions are. Check your eligibility against my ready-reckoner of the 13 most common reasons you may be able to reclaim your PPI. Even if your reason isn’t on that list, you have nothing to lose by trying and may win back hundreds or even thousands of pounds.

Step 1 – Check Your Policy

You will need your paperwork for this one, so if you don’t have it, you may need to go on a little fishing expedition with your lender. Ask your lender for the Terms and Conditions that applied to your policy at the time you took it out, as it would have changed and evolved over time and court cases.

If your credit account with them is still open, they are obliged under the Consumer Credit Act to supply such information but they are able to charge £1 for this service, but not all do. To save playing letter ping-pong more than you have to, and for the sake of a pound, enclose a cheque for the amount made payable to the company in question. They may or may not cash it, but it will likely speed things along.

If your account has long since closed, they may refuse your request. In this case you can perform a Data Protection Act Subject Access Request instead. The fee for this is £10 and they will take that tenner, so be sure to include it. Either way you’ll get the information you need.

Martin Lewis from the Money Saving Expert has the letters you’ll need here:

• Asking for your Policy Terms and Conditions (MS Word)
• Requesting Copies of Paperwork (MS Word)

Step 2 – Check You Have a Valid Claim

Once you have the necessary items, you can begin to see if you have a valid claim with regards to reclaiming PPI and interest. Look for any mentions of payment cover, payment protection, payment insurance, loan protection, loan care and other such terms within the T&C’s. If you find anything you don’t understand or is ambiguous, ask your lender to clarify.

As I said in part 1, there are some blindingly obvious examples of PPI mis-selling but my list of 13 examples is by no means an exhaustive list. The bottom line is if you feel like you were sold the policy incorrectly, fraudulently, unfairly or were unaware you even had it, reclaim reclaim reclaim!

Step 3 – Write To Your Lender

Once you’ve gathered your paperwork and made some checks against your reason(s) to claim, you need to write to your lender making your complaint and outlining your case. Again MSE has the template letter you’ll need.

• Editable Reclaim Complaint Document (MS Word)
• Financial Ombudsman Service Questionaire Help

If your lender was mainstream, you may find additional information on their websites about PPI mis-selling and reclaiming. Find additional details for the main banks: Barclays, Clydesdale, Co-op, Halifax, HSBC, Lloyds,Nationwide, NatWest/RBS, Santander.

Remember: Don’t give up! It is in the lender’s interest to see if they can reject your claim and hope you will just go away. Write back to them and reiterate the reason(s) you believe the policy to have been mis-sold, and ask them to reconsider. Mention that your next step will be the Financial Ombudsman Service but you would prefer to resolve this amicably and without involving another body.

Step 4 – Write to the Ombudsman

If you still have your claim rejected, then it is time to write to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) with your complaint. The FOS is the official independent complaint resolution service for settling disputes between financial institutions and consumers, and are well versed in all things PPI.

The FOS can only get involved if you have not reached a satisfactory result 8 weeks after your initial complaint to the lender itself. But once involved, they will decide whether you have a case or not, and not the bank. It isn’t a quick service – some cases have taken over a year to resolve – but it is completely free, and around 88% of cases taken up by the Ombudsman have awarded in favour of the consumer.

To make your complaint give them a ring  on 08000 234 5679 (or 0300 1239 123 from a mobile), or you can file direct on their website.

You will need to back up your complaint in writing, but the FOS has a template letter you can use to do so.

• FOS Template Complaint Letter (MS Word)

Step 5 – Getting Further Help

Sometimes it helps just to chat through your circumstances with others who have been there and done that. There are forums dedicated to just that over at Money Saving Expert who will be able to guide you in the specifics.

Martin Lewis (of Money Saving Expert) has also prepared a highly detailed FAQ  with just about every PPI reclaim-related question you could think of.

Good luck, and let me know how you get on!

This is part 2 of a 3-part article on reclaiming Payment Protection Insurance (PPI), and is an interview with someone who took on Lloyds TSB on their own, sharing their tips and savvy tricks and their outcome.

Part 1 covers exactly what PPI is, how it applies to products, and how and why the PPI Refund industry has taken off recently. It also exposes the 13 most common reasons you may be due to a PPI refund. 

Part 3 covers exactly how to go about reclaiming on your own, for free.

This morning I’m interviewing Bryony, a 27 year old female from Portsmouth who has done exactly what I’m going to show you how to do tomorrow -and won! – without having to spend out a penny beyond the cost of posting a couple of letters.

Hi Bryony! Thanks for agreeing to share your PPI success story. I hope it will encourage others to take the plunge and give it a go.

When and how did you first realise you may be due a PPI refund?

“I first read about PPI reclaims several years ago through articles posted on moneysavingexpert.co.uk and consumeractiongroup.co.uk. There was lots of information on the court case and how to claim on both sites which was really helpful.”

What was the product you were mis-sold on, and which company was involved?

“The product was a Lloyds TSB credit card, originally sold to under the name of ‘More Than’ back in 2003.”

How was the PPI mis-sold on that card?

“Back in 2003 when I got the credit card, I was a full time student and was at any point in that year only working 8 hours per week, therefore I would not have been covered for Payment Protection [Insurance]. Based on my employment situation, I should not have been offered the cover in the first place and was paying for an insurance that I could not claim under [if I needed to].”

 So how did you go about re-claiming?

“I wrote to Lloyds TSB using a template that I found on the comsumeractiongroup.co.uk website and edited it to suit my situation. I detailed the reason that I believed the PPI was missold and requested repayment in full of all premiums paid and statutory interest. [8%]“

 So you did it all yourself, rather than employ a PPI reclaim company?

Yes, I did a bit of research into the process of reclaiming and realised that there was nothing a claims company could do for me that I couldn’t do myself, except take a cut of my repayment for themselves!

I wrote a letter using an edited template reclaim letter, this initial request was rejected on the grounds that although I could not have claimed on the insurance at the time I took out the credit account, once I’d finished university (3 years after taking out the card) and got a full time job, I was then eligible for the insurance.

A couple of years later I read an article that said many banks had been rejecting genuine claims and wrote another letter explaining that I would like my case to be reopened. My reasoning was that at the time of purchase, the PPI was missold and it was irrelevent whether I would be eligible for it in the future.

When did you start reclaiming, and how long did it take?

“My initial letter was written back in 2008 but after several months, this was rejected. I reopened my case in June 2011 and received my settlement cheque today (April 2012).”

Was it hard to do it on your own?

“The actual letter writing part is very easy, there are some very good templates available as a starting point, and you usually only need to add a paragraph or 2 describing the reason that you feel you were missold the PPI. Some banks are providing ‘quick claim’ forms on their websites.

The hardest part is the waiting, it is generally not a quick process, but the day when you open the settlement envelope makes it all worthwhile.”

How much did you win back in the end?

“Total amount of PPI reclaimed was £509 (including statutory interest)”

Now that’s pretty good for a credit card. Of course, the potential refund and interest amounts can be much higher for loans. Is there anything you know now, that you wish you’d known at the beginning of your reclaim journey?

“Never give up, and never assume that your bank will stick to any timeline, even if they set it themselves!

If you plan to reclaim PPI on a loan or credit card, never treat it as guaranteed money, never budget to include it and never rely on it. Just send off your letter and IF you get a repayment, thats great – but it could take years of patience. My settlement cheque came completely out of the blue, a wonderful surprise and a triumph over mis-selling!”

 

Thanks for your time and for sharing your amazing self-generated success, Bryony!

Tomorrow in Part 3 I will walk you through exactly what you need to start your reclaim journey, and as Bryony has already started, point you in the direction of further resources that can help should you encounter any lender avoidance tactics.

Would you like to share your success (or not-so-successful) reclaim stories? Come chat in the comments.

Once upon a time I was a small boy, and life was simple.

I got up, I went to school, I learned cool stuff, and I came home again. Then I ate my prepared-for-me dinner, I played with friends, and then I went to bed to prepare myself to do it all over again.

Then overnight somehow, I became an adult. Now I have bills bills bills, little time to play, and even do all the cooking! (It’s ok though. I enjoy cooking. Honest!). But every service and policy renews at different times and it’s made even harder when some places ‘helpfully’ rely on you not remembering and just automatically renewing policies and stinging you in the wallet.

My Home Insurance Quote

My current home insurance provider did, thankfully, send a letter reminding me they will helpfully automatically renew my cover in 28 days and that I “need do nothing”. They also helpfully put up the price by £103.29 despite not having claimed on it once, or even having spoken to them throughout the entire duration of the policy!

So step one, I rang to let them know that I have no intention of renewing. I knew I’d made the right decision as that phone call alone took nearly 20 minutes, and if you’re wanting to make a claim then being on hold for 20 minutes is not a great way to calm your nerves.

Find a Better Home Insurance Quote

Rule Number 1 is shop around. The Internet takes virtually all effort out of what used to take hours. Before comparison websites came into their own, I’d spend around 2-3 hours comparing policies, cover options, company reviews and all sorts.

This is wasted time. Why? Because you will never manage to check out, compare, remember or even find to begin with, the majority of home insurance companies out there. And this is where comparison websites have saved us not only a fortune in money, but a fortune in time.

Pop your details into a form, hit the magic button, and sit back and wait for the results to come in. Choose the cheapest one, check the cover, and sign on up! I performed my ‘winning’ check on Money Supermarket but there are plenty out there to choose from. The cover was slightly better than what I had previously (including accidental damage as standard rather than at an additional premium) and was less than what I paid last year.

Get A New Home Insurance Quote Every Year

The second most important piece of advice I can give is, much with every other service and insurance quote you get: shop around, and shop around very time it comes up to renew. Never settle for “it will do”, or “I don’t have time to change” because what it doesn’t cost you time, will cost you in your wallet. As I’ve demonstrated it took 10 minutes to fill in the comparison form, about 60 seconds for all the results to come in, and then another 10 minutes to sign up and purchase my new policy to start the moment my old one finishes.

That 21 minutes of effort saved me £111.70. If you paid yourself at that rate, that’s nearly £320 an hour. Worth finding the time to do, wouldn’t you agree?

Wait. Did I say the second most important piece of advice up there?

Yes. I did. And here’s the most important one:

Don’t pay your home insurance premium monthly, if it is anything other than 0%. You’re just throwing money down the drain otherwise, particularly if your credit is not brilliant. 24% APR is not unheard of and on a £150 premium that will add an extra £36 on to the top of your policy!

Coming up for renewal? Get your home insurance quote today and start saving too.