Terms of Business
Providing you with Quotations
Quotations are provided free of charge unless otherwise stated. It is imperative that you disclose all relevant information to us, so that we may arrange a suitable policy on your behalf. Quotations are only valid at the time they are given, due to the insurer’s ability to amend rates at any period during the year. We endeavour to provide you with full details regarding an insurance policy at the time of quotation and at the point of sale, so that you are in a position to make an informed decision on whether to proceed with the application. If the insurance being arranged is ‘Motor Insurance’, we will advise you of any specific restrictions or policy warranties, e.g. ‘Vehicle Garaging’ and/or ‘Vehicle Security Requirements’. Quotations may be withdrawn at any time if the insurer amends its premium or terms, and/or your personal information has changed.
We offer a variety of policies from a number of insurers depending on the type of insurance purchased. We are able to provide you with a list of insurers that we arrange insurance with if you request.
Disclosure of Information
It is important that you understand that any information, statements or answers made by you to either your insurer or us are your responsibility and must be correct. The Insurer relies on this information to set the premium and accept the contract. This is the basis of the ‘contract of utmost good faith’ utilized by the entire insurance industry.
Your attention is drawn in particular to the importance of the declaration and signature on any Insurer’s proposal form or statement of fact, as the failure to disclose material facts that may affect the insurance, or any inaccuracies in your answers, may invalidate your insurance cover in part or in whole. Material facts are matters that could influence your proposal or renewal. They must be disclosed at the earliest opportunity and certainly at each renewal. If you have any doubt regarding this matter, please contact us and we will be happy to assist you if required. You are advised to keep copies of documentation sent to or received from us for your own protection.
Policy Terms and Conditions
When a policy is issued you are strongly advised to read it carefully. This is the document that includes the schedule and certificate of insurance that forms the basis of the contract between you and the insurer. If you are in any doubt over any of the policy terms and conditions, please contact us immediately.
Data Protection
Any information that you disclose to us will be kept fully confidential, and will not be made available to any other parties other than where necessary to arrange your insurance and deal with any claims made, or in cases where we are required to do so by any legal, statutory or regulatory body. Under the Data Protection Act 1988 you have the right to see personal information about you that we hold on our records and this will be made available to you for a nominal charge (see Charges section) should you so require. Insurers will pass information to the Claims and Underwriting Exchange run by Insurance Database Services Ltd and to the Motor Insurance Anti-Fraud and Theft Register run by the Association of British Insurers. This process is undertaken in order to check the information provided by you and to prevent fraudulent claims. Motor insurance details are added to the Motor Insurance Database run by the MotorInsurersInformationCenter, which has been formed to help identify uninsured drivers. In the event of an accident, Insurers and the Motor Insurers Bureau can access the database to identify relevant policy information. To preserve your confidentiality we may ask you to provide us with formal written authority to deal with any other person that you have asked us to contact - such as a friend or family member - prior to us dealing with them.
Professional Indemnity
We fully accept responsibility for any advice that we offer you, but in the event of an error or omission, we maintain Professional Indemnity Insurance for your protection and ease of mind.
Payment of Premiums
In addition to cash, postal orders, cheques and bankers drafts we accept most major debit and credit cards. We advise that we may make a charge if you choose to make a payment via credit card to offset charges made upon us for this type of transaction; if this is the case we will always advise you beforehand. We also provide payment facilities via finance companies. We recommend that if you opt for this payment method, you thoroughly check the terms and conditions of this facility. If we raise an invoice for payment of a deposit or the premium we request that this is paid within the due time to enable cover to continue. Failure to remit any outstanding premiums may jeopardise cover.
Handling Client and Insurance Company Money.
Our financial arrangements with most Insurance Companies are on a Risk Transfer basis. This means that we hold premiums and refunds due to clients on behalf of the insurance undertaking concerned and under a Risk Transfer Agreement. Such monies are deemed to be held by the Insurer(s) with which your insurance is arranged. If Risk Transfer does not apply such monies will be held by us in a Statutory Client Trust Account in accordance with FSA rules. For the purpose of some transactions, client money may pass through other authorised intermediaries. Interest will not be paid to clients in respect of money held in Client Trust Accounts.
Documents.
We reserve the right to withhold (for a motor insurance policy) the annual certificate of insurance pending full payment of premium.
Charges.
In addition to the premium that you pay, we may make a charge for work carried out by us. We summarise below charges that we may make and how our income is derived. All policy fees in the event of policy cancellation are non-refundable.
· Our Income – Our remuneration will either be as a commission, which is a percentage of the insurance premium (before Insurance Premium Tax) paid to insurers, or as a fee, or a combination of the two. Commission and fees are earned for the policy period and we will be entitled to retain all commission and fees in relation to policies placed by us in respect of the full policy period. If the commission earned and a fee to be charged exceeds 25% of the total amount payable, we will advise you.
· Mid Term Policy Changes – In addition to any administration fee or an increase/decrease in premium made by the insurers following a policy alteration/cancellation, we will make a charge for the work carried out by us to make the adjustment with the insurer concerned. This also includes requests made by you for us to arrange duplicate insurance documents or cover notes for taxation. The charge that we may make for this service is usually £25.00. For policy cancellations we do not refund the part of the premium that represents our commission.
· Dishonoured / Represented Payments – £25.00
· Data Protection – We will make a charge of £10.00 to supply data held on you. We will provide this data to you within 40 days of receiving your payment.
Complaints and Compensation Procedure.
We aim to offer a high level of customer service at all times, if however you are not satisfied, contact Gavin Mead by telephone on 01392 426799 or in writing to the above address. We do have in operation a full complaints procedure, which is available upon request. If you are still not satisfied after speaking with Gavin Mead you may be able to refer the matter to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
We are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). You may be entitled to compensation from the scheme if we cannot meet our obligations. This depends on the type of insurance, size of the business and the circumstances of the claim. Further information about the compensation scheme arrangements is available from the FSCS.