Terms of Business

Important Information

Our service
Castle Insurance is authorised and regulated by the FSA (Financial Services Authority) and our FSA registration number is 301083. The FSA is the independent watchdog that regulates financial services. It requires us to give you this document. Use this document to decide if our services are right for you. In arranging insurance for our clients, we act as an Independent Intermediary. Our service includes: advising you on your insurance needs; arranging your insurance cover with insurers to meet your requirements; and helping you with any ongoing changes you have to make. We can also issue policies on behalf of certain insurers. We act on your behalf in arranging your insurance. We offer a wide range of insurance products and have access to leading insurers in the market place. We will give you full details of any such arrangements before you make any commitment on any product we offer you. We will send you documents confirming the full details of your cover and the insurer, and details of the premium you have paid.

Disclosure
It is your responsibility to provide complete and accurate information to insurers when you take out your insurance policy, throughout the life of your policy, and when you renew your insurance. Failure to disclose information pertaining to your insurance, or any inaccuracies in information given, could result in your insurance policy being invalid or cover not operating fully. It is important that you ensure all statements you make on proposal forms, claim forms and other documents are full and accurate. If a form is completed on your behalf, you should check that the answers shown to any questions are true and accurate before signing the document. You are reminded that it is an offence under the Road Traffic Act to make any false statements or withhold any relevant information to obtain a Certificate of Motor Insurance. Please note that under the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 you are not required to disclose convictions regarded as "Spent". You are advised to keep copies of any correspondence you send to us or direct to your insurer. If you are in any doubt about whether information is material, you should disclose it. This notice should be shown to anyone insured to drive a vehicle under the policy.

Quotations
All quotations are subject to change in respect of the amount of premium indicated, and/or the terms and conditions that are applied.

Choosing to receive limited information
If you want to buy your insurance without receiving all the information about the products and services that the FSA require us to provide to you, we will keep a record of your written agreement to this.

Policy terms and conditions and warranties
You should read through all policy terms, conditions and warranties shown on your policy documentation. Please ensure you understand them and are able to follow their requirements exactly. If not, please advise us immediately, as a breach of any terms, conditions or warranties may enable your insurer to terminate your policy from the date of that breach, and/or repudiate a claim under your policy.

Right of Cancellation
Once you have entered into an agreement with us for the services we provide in respect of your insurance requirements, you are entitled to a period of 14 days to reflect on whether to proceed with the purchase of the contract. To cancel the contract within the cancellation period, please write to us enclosing any certificates or cover notes in your possession. You will be charged a proportion of the insurance premium for the cover afforded to date and may be charged a proportion of any of our fees that we have incurred. Legal expenses premium is non-refundable in any event. If a claim has been made under the policy, then the full annual premium will be due.

Customer Protection information
It is our intention to provide you with a high level of customer service at all times. If there are occasions when we do not meet your standards, please contact the member of staff you were dealing with, either verbally or in writing. They will take details of your concerns and we will then acknowledge in writing, advising you of who is dealing with the matter and attempt to address this within 5 working days. If our investigations take longer, we will provide a full response within 20 working days, or explain our position and provide timescales for a full response. If you remain dissatisfied, please ask to speak to one of the Partners of the business. If we find that your complaint is valid, we will agree with you a mutually acceptable form of redress. If we cannot resolve your query within the specified time limit, you may contact the following:

The Financial Ombudsman Service, South Quay Plaza,183 Marsh Wall London E14 9SR Tel: 08450801800 Fax: 02079641001 email: enquiries@financial-ombudsman.org.uk

By making a complaint, you do not prejudice your rights to any legal proceedings. FOS will also handle disputes for commercial clients with a turnover not exceeding £1m

Renewals
As from January 2005, Insurers are obliged to inform the Motor Insurance Database of all motor policy transactions within 14 days. Insurers have therefore taken the decision to remove the 14 day temporary covernote previously issued on all renewal notices with effect from 1st November 2004. This means all Motor Policies must be renewed on or before the renewal date - no days of grace are allowed, and all policies will automatically expire on the renewal date. Policies renewed after the renewal date will be set up as new business and cover will be deemed to have not been in force for the interim period. The renewal premium can therefore not be guaranteed anytime after the renewal date and we recommend you advise your renewal instructions at the earliest possible time. In good time before the renewal of your policy we shall contact you with the renewal premium and terms for the coming year. Where premiums are collected through insurer instalments, we shall renew the policy automatically on your behalf. If you do not wish to renew the policy, please let us know as soon as possible.

Financial Services Compensation Scheme
We are covered by the FSCS. You may be entitled to compensation from the scheme if we cannot meet our obligations. This depends on the type of business and the circumstances of the claim. FSCS is the single compensation scheme created under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (the Act). FSCS covers claims against firms where they are unable, or likely to be unable, to pay claims against them. In general this is when a firm is insolvent or has gone out of business. FSCS has the power to compensate consumers in the event of the failure of any firm authorised under the Act, and covers insurance companies, deposit-takers and investment firms.

Governing Law
This agreement shall be governed by the laws of England and Wales and the parties agree herewith that any dispute arising out of it shall be subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English Courts.

Agreement
In reading this agreement you are deemed to have accepted its content. Should you not accept any part of this agreement, please contact us within 14 days of receipt and the above address.

Premiums and financial aspects
In order to be able to offer you credit facilities, we are registered under the Consumer Credit Act and our Licence Number is 393934. We normally accept payment by guaranteed cheque, cash, and the following credit/debit cards - Visa, MasterCard, Delta or Switch.You may be able to spread your payments through insurers' instalment schemes (varying according to insurer written details on request), a credit scheme with a third party finance provider, or by three consecutive monthly payments - payable to us commencing the inception date and due the same date for the next two months. A charge will be made per instalment depending on premium and will be advised at the time of quotation. These charges will not be included in any cancellation refunds. We will give you full information about your payment options when we discuss your insurance in detail.We may keep certain documents, such as your insurance policy documents or Certificate, while we are waiting for full payment of premiums. In these circumstances, we will ensure that you receive full details of your insurance cover and will provide you with any documents that you are required to have by law.

Charges
As Independent Intermediaries, we are paid commission by your insurance company, details of which are available on request. We normally make the following charges to cover the administration of your insurances:

Arranging new policies/renewals/adjustments £15.00

The specific charge and purpose of any additional charges will always be advised to you in advance.

Return premiums
(usually arising if an insurance risk is reduced or a policy cancelled) On a return premium, we repay commission on the amount to your insurer and this will be deducted from the final amount due to you. In view of the costs involved, we will not issue any return premium that is less than £25 (after deducting reclaimed commission). An amount less than £25 will be held to your credit and can be utilised against any future insurance policy with us. If a policy is cancelled, the following cancellation scales will apply:

Period of cover up to one month two months three months four months five months six months seven months eight months
Premium payable 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

We must advise that the cancellation scales above apply in all respects and therefore if paying over terms, you will be responsible for any outstanding monies due following cancellation. Further action will be taken to recover any outstanding balance. You must send us your certificate of insurance before we can cancel your policy together with a letter confirming your wish to cancel. Cancelling your direct debit payment does NOT cancel your policy. No refund is given in the event of a claim on a policy and full annual premium is payable.We will also charge a premium of £15.00 to cover the cost of uninsured loss recovery service provided by Wisecall Recovery Services on all motor and home policies (This is optional and will be advised in advance) If you purchase this service and your policy is subsequently cancelled, no refund is given on any part of this premium.We will hold monies received from you in a designated Insurance Bank Account, which is set up as a trust governed by FSA rules. We will remit such monies to insurers in line with our agreements with them. WE may agree to extend credit to other customers using client money but have in place and will maintain at all times systems and controls adequate to ensure that we follow the guidelines set by FSA. We shall only draw our commission after we have received the premium from you and in accordance with FSA regulations and agreements that we hold with Insurers.

Confidentiality and Data Protection
All personal and sensitive information about our customers is treated as Private and Confidential. We will only use and disclose the information we have about private individuals in the normal course of arranging and administering their insurances, and will not disclose any information to any other parties without their written consent. Unless we are notified of any changes, we shall assume the personal and sensitive data we hold about our customers is correct, and shall use it to provide quotations when policies fall due for renewal. In the interests of security and to improve our service, telephone calls you make to us may be monitored and/or recorded. We may pass information about you to credit reference agencies for the purposes of arranging payments by instalments, and may also pass to them details of your payment record with us. Under the Data Protection Act 1998, private customers have a right to see personal information about them that we hold in our records. A charge may be made for this service. If you wish to exercise this right, or have any other related queries, you should write to us at the above address. We may have to allow access to your records by a regulator or complaints resolution body.

Claims
When we receive notification of an incident that might give rise to a claim under your policy, we will inform the insurer without delay and, in any event, within three working days. We will advise you promptly of insurers requirements concerning claims, including the provision, as soon as possible, of information required to establish the nature and extent of a loss. We will forward any payments received from insurers in respect of any claim, to you, without delay. We will notify you of any request for information we receive from your insurers.

The Claims and Underwriting Exchange Register
Insurers share information with each other via the Claims and Underwriting Exchange Register, and the Motor Insurance Anti-Fraud and Theft Register, to aid the prevention of fraudulent claims. In the event of a claim, the information you supply on the claim form, together with any other information relating to the claim, will be put on the Registers.

Motor Insurer Information Centre (MIIC)
Insurers are legally required to provide and maintain details of motor insurance policies to the Motor Insurance Database to which the police and others have access. This helps the pursuance of claims following accidents and aids detection of those who are in contravention of the law by not taking out insurance.

Use for marketing purposes
We may use information held about you, to provide you information about other products and services which we offer, and which we feel may be appropriate to you, by email, telephone, post or other means. You may exercise your right to give notice to stop data being processed for marketing purposes by contacting us at any time. Please call us on 01913830401.

Ownership
Castle Insurance services is owned jointly by Robert Paul Younger and Colin Phil Younger and the trading address is 15 Marshall Terrace, Gilesgate, Durham DH1 2HX Tel: 0191 3830401 Fax: 0191 3830063 email paul@castleinsuranceservices.co.uk

We'll Give You a Specialist Insurance Quote