Car Stolen, Insurance issues, need advice.

[VE_CalaisV8]

Pat,

Insurance Companies legally HAVE to contact you about a missed premium and legally HAVE to warn you again that without paying missed premium(s) then cover will be cancelled.

AAMI will need to prove that they made all efforts to contact you, and you will need to prove that IF they did make efforts to warn/contact you, that you didn't receive it.

That's the tricky one, how do I prove that I never received it? Obviously I know I never saw it otherwise I would've rectified it immediately. But that's just my word against theirs. Noone can totally prove that that mail was received by me. And my argument is, for such an important thing as a car insurance policy being voided, a letter is not an appropriate way of notifying their customer. I get it that they can't call everyone everytime a payment is missed, a letter or email is adequate there, but the last straw if nothing is sorted should surely be a phone call or automated text (which is apparently what they do now, but not two months ago......)

 

[Jecs]

mate for what its worth, i hope everything works out for you. you're already in a **** place, last thing you need is to make it worse.

 

[monkey]

Really sucks when things just go from bad to worse mate but you may have a case as ombudsman says. I am with aami and received a letter recently saying I hadnt payed my premium. I pay yearly and have bpay set up on internet banking.

Now in July, new financial year, aami had some changes like the name they trade under and other businessy crap I got no idea about. I was made aware of this by letter before that date. A change I was not aware of was my billing details, possible I missed that bit, forgot or they neglected to mention. I had paid to the old numbers by mistake. They were very helpful over the phone, apparently they had already fixed my mistake.

Anyway it sounds possible that during the changeover something has happened and you have stopped being billed automatically. Whether they had informed you this would be the case or not I dont know but probably worth finding out. Best of luck mate.

 

[Rajesh Koothrappali]

This really is ****! How big is the active JC community? Could we "pass the cup around" to help him at least get his car back on the road? I.e. get the necessary mechanical repairs done.

 

[mpower]

That's horrible news OP, hope it gets sorted.

 

[Grennan]

This is why letters like this should be sent via registered mail.

Knowing Aus Post its probably sitting in the bottom of someones truck.

I would be hitting up the Ombudsman. Im currently with RACV and I canceled my cards after I misplaced my wallet and they rang me, sent me a txt message and sent me a letter in the mail saying I had 1 month to pay otherwise id be uninsured.

If theyre relying on just a letter, theres really to much to go wrong and theres no confirmation.

It sounds like bad practice, but AAMI arent reknown for their sterling service.

 

[Deltak]

Hi,

You said that you normally pay monthly by DIRECT DEBIT. This allows the insurer to take money directly from your account. The sting in the fine print is that you cannot stop these withdrawals, only the insurer can stop payments.

You can stop the arrangement if either you get a replacement card through loss or the card is out of date. A replacement card will stop all your direct debit payments and they need to be updated separately with each provider. As soon as this happens, the insurer etc has their claim bounced and they come after you very quickly to maintain their cash flow.

I have found that a replacement card request was the only way to cancel some providers direct debit.

A Card replacement may have happened to you thus causing the difficulties with the insurer.

You were negligent in not paying the premium. AAMI would have to prove you were notified, you would have to provide a Statutory Declaration that no notification was received. The ombudsman would then have to make a decision. I guess that you should mention in your dealings with the insurer the length of time you have been with them and the payments were Direct Debit and effectively out of your control.

I hope that all works out with the insurer and the problem gets sorted quickly.

 

[Tatiana]

Given this a bit more thought. If you pay by direct debit and there is no record of you cancelling this payment either directly with the bank, which they can verify, or with the Insurance Company and the payment was rejected by insufficient funds, then that shows you had intent to continue the payment method and that the payment was ceased without your knowledge.

Surely someone higher up has to acknowledge that and allow you to pay the instalments for July, August and September then honour your claim.

Keep us informed of your journey with the Company.

 

[mpower]

yeah you'd think they'd hound you for an automatic payment bouncing not just cancel the policy.....

 

[gopher]

Good luck but I wouldn't hold my breath for a satisfactory outcome
AAMI were Among the worst for not paying out after the Qld floods