Category Archives: Stolen Car

My BMW Z3 was stolen from the Hillcroft Garage in Langstone, Newport in July 2006. Direct Line Insurance paid the wrong person for it, Royal Sun Alliance haven’t repaired it. Find out the full story here.

Rants, Stolen Car

My house is up for sale for £118,950

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I just heard from a friend of mine that my house is up for sale with estate agents Darlows. You can view the listing online here.

Now, I knew it was going up for sale but I didn’t know they’d be listing it as 3 bedrooms. You see, it’s a 4 bedroom house. They’ve classed the smaller of the 4 bedrooms as a study, thus reducing the value of the property. This has been done because the money grabbing ex-wife wants a quick sale as she’s up to her eyes in debt. Defrauding Direct Line insurance didn’t help her there, I’m sure by now they’ve asked her for the money back.

Anyhow, it’s all relative as the house won’t actually be sold. I’ve been paying the mortgage solely for the past year, costing me around £8,000, and she wants 65% of the equity. Hmm, not much point me paying it anymore then eh? So I’ve not been. At the end of October the mortgage company will instigate proceedings to repossess the house, and they can have it too… with my blessing.

65% of nothing is, er… nothing. Greedy slag.

Royal & SunAlliance, Stolen Car

My final demand to Royal & Sun Alliance

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I’ve recently sent this letter off to Royal & Sun Alliance as my patience with them is at an end. Hopefully now they’ll actually do something and fix the car they were supposed to fix last year. I live more in hope than in expectation, but as my previous blog showed; they do read this website, so maybe it’ll spur them into dynamic action.

Zoe Banks
Royal & Sun Alliance
PO Box 21561
Stirling
Scotland
FK7 1AA

Reference: **************

Zoe, thank you for your letter dated 31st July with regards to my car, the BMW Z3, registration P192 PLR.

However I feel you may over looked a few points.

I understand that there would be no need to replace the lock set for my car if the key had been recovered because a new key cannot be made without adequate documentation for the vehicle. However, the key was never recovered. I had to give my spare key to the Hillcroft in order for them to recover my car.

I only ever had one key back, my spare key.

If as you say the car was recovered with the key in the ignition then please produce the key. I will accept that the locks do not need changing if you can provide me with the original key, otherwise replace the locks as instructed.

With regards to the damage and providing an estimate, I’m afraid I cannot do that as the car is no longer insured, taxed or MOT’d and as such cannot take the car to a repair shop. It was 13 months ago when you should have acted. I have tried to get someone to come to see the car where it resides, but alas no one is interested in doing so.

So, as again it was your fault the car was not fixed last year I expect you to arrange for someone to visit the car to provide an estimate, and then repair it. Please let me know when you have made these arrangements. The car is currently located at *********, Newport.

With regards to the £55 you owe me for lost items, I am not willing to wait any longer for this as it been over a year. Kindly send me a cheque to my Manchester address without further delay for that amount.

Finally, with regards to the content on the website www.mrdaz.com; all statements on the website are accurate. If RSA is embarrassed by the content it is perhaps due to RSA’s incompetence over the past year. You will also find on the website detailing of further incompetent acts by various parties, including Direct Line, who are also responsible for the mess surrounding the BMW.

Their case is currently with the financial ombudsman.

I record all of my phone calls, and am entitled to do so. They are posted on the website as I believe it is in the interest of all concerned to discover just how bad customer service can be with various companies, including RSA.

I will consider removing the content once this matter has been resolved to my satisfaction. I have seen little sign of that so far, one year on.

I look forward to your reply.

Regards

Darren Jamieson

Let’s see what they come back with. I have a feeling I’ll be buried with that car, still unfixed.

Direct Line Insurance, Google, Internet, Stolen Car

Insurance company keeps tabs on MrDaz.com

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While checking my website stats this morning I noticed a very interesting referral from an unknown source. It seems that 7 times between September 8th and September 22nd I have received visitors from a desktop application that checks claims history…

Interesting. This means that my website has a link pasted into it in someone’s application at an Insurance company, and they’ve been regularly clicking on the link to view my site. Obviously unknowing that I can track them. Now the question is, is this Royal & Sun Alliance or is it Direct Line?

Whoever it is, their reference in the database for my site is: 67752 – as you can see from this screen shot of my stats from Google Analytics.

Insurance statistics

Hello people from the Insurance company! Nice to see you frequent my website. If it’s Direct Line looking at my site, don’t worry, the financial ombudsman will be in touch shortly, but if it’s Royal & Sun Alliance as I suspect, deal with my last letter as instructed. Fix my damn car as you should have done over a year ago and send me the money you owe me.

If you spent more time dealing with your claims and doing your job instead of browsing my (admittedly very amusing) website you wouldn’t have any of the trouble you have now.

Direct Line Insurance, Humour, Internet, Stolen Car

Direct Line reject MrDaz as an affiliate

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As an affiliate marketer I’m always on the lookout for new opportunities to make money from different merchants. While browsing through Tradedoubler last week I noticed some adverts for Direct Line Insurance… you may remember that Direct Line are the scam merchants who tried to reposess my car after paying out the wrong person.

Well, as a website for this merchant I added none other that MrDaz.com. Guess what? I received this reply from the theiving bastards.

From: TradeDoubler [mailto:no_reply@ext.tradedoubler.com]
Sent: 23 September 2007 22:01
To: ***@*******.***
Subject: TradeDoubler application declined / denied

Unfortunately your application for http://www.mrdaz.com to Direct Line have been denied.

The most likely reason is that the merchant did not think that the content of your site was suitable for them. To see if the merchant has a specific criteria when evaluatating affiliate sites, please see the merchant program page.

Best regards,

TradeDoubler

The funny thing us of course, whenever I mention Direct Line on this blog I get Direct Line adverts pop up from Google Adsense, so their ads are on here anyway. Doubt my site is much of an advert though. If you want to be ripped off and lose the whole value of your car, go with Direct Line. I did, and my car is still sat dormant 14 months on!

Royal & SunAlliance, Stolen Car

RSA fuck up again

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For those of you eagerly awaiting for an update on my stolen car (and I’ve had emails requesting info) here’s the latest.

Direct Line insist they were not at fault, and their offer of 200 quid remains their final offer. Naturally that’s going to the financial ombudsman now.

RSA have replied and offered to fix the car and pay for the stolen items, some 13 months after the car was nicked. BUT they won’t pay for a new lock set because they said the car was recovered with the keys in the ignition.

Was it???

I never had them back, which is why I had to give the spare key to the garage to pick my car up. If the original keys were recovered with the car, where are they?

Maybe they could tell me?

I’ll be replying to RSA and instructing them to return my keys, if they say they were recovered, and if not to pay for the sodding locks to be changed like they should have done last September.

They also asked for all blogs to come off this site that talk about them. If they weren’t so consistently incompetent I would, but people really need to know about this shit.

Direct Line Insurance, Stolen Car

Direct Line duck and weave

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August 1st is approaching fast and with it Direct Line’s deadline to fix the situation. I chased them today, again at great expense to myself as these phone calls over the last 12 months have proved costly, and they gave me some more bullshit.

Seems they’ve decided their decision is the same, and they are not admitting they are liable for the mistake and therefore will not offer me any compensation for the cost to myself as a result of their fuck up.

This will now be taken further as I believe they have acted illegally.

I’m happy in a way because it means I have more blog material for some time to come.

Direct Line Insurance, Stolen Car

My Reply to Direct Line

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As promised, here is my repost to Direct Line concerning their apology of sorts and offer of 200GBP compensation.

Chris Moat
Direct Line Insurance plc
3 Edridge House
Croydon
CR9 1AG

Tuesday July 9th 2007

Dear Chris,

I have received and considered your reply and offer of 200GBP ‘compensation’ for my trouble over the past 12 months. However, the offer of 200GBP barely covers this last month’s loan repayments on the car, a car that your company have made impossible for me to use for a year.

Your claim that you are not liable for the depreciation of the car, for the storage of the car and for the loan I have repaid this last year is in error. The sole reason I have been paying for the vehicle and did not sell it in 2006 is because you negligently paid out the wrong person on the car, after it had been recovered, and subsequently placed a marker on the vehicle claiming that Direct Line were now the legal owners. This was YOUR error, an error that I have been paying for ever since, and am STILL paying for today.

Your offer of 200GBP is woefully unacceptable, derisory and offensive. Obviously I must decline your insulting offer as it doesn’t even cover the MOT, TAX and Insurance for the vehicle, which was all in place this time last year.

You have admitted that you made a mistake in not attempting to find out who the legal owner of the vehicle was, and in ignoring my efforts to relay to you the facts. You were defrauded by Mrs Jamieson when she illegally claimed that she was the owner of the vehicle in order to extract money from you when you were both aware that Royal & Sun Alliance were liable for the loss of the vehicle.

Your colleague Ray Harper has already admitted his disgust at the actions of your company with regards to dealing with this case, and that his intentions in passing the case to Chloe O’Driscol were for you to find in my favour. This of course you did not do. I genuinely feel that I had I not brought the financial ombudsman into the equation you would still be withholding my V5 and insisting you had a legal claim over my vehicle.

I should advise you also that I record all of my phone conversations as a matter of course and in the public interest reserve the right to broadcast any of them as the evolution of this claim has long since descended into farce.

I reiterate my desire to be fully compensated for the depreciation of my car, the storage for the car and for the loan repayments I have made on the vehicle while it was unable to be used as a direct result of your actions.

If this matter is not resolved satisfactorily by August 1st it will be passed to the financial ombudsman as Direct Line have been incompetent, negligent and have in my opinion, acted illegally.

I look forward to your reply.

Kind Regards

Darren Jamieson

Direct Line Insurance, Stolen Car

Direct Line send me a letter!

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I’ve received this letter from Direct Line’s Chris Moat, have a read:

Dear Mr Jamieson

Thank you for your letter dated 5 June 2007 and your patience whilst your concerns have been investigated.

I understand your frustration with how Mrs Jamieson’s claim has been dealt with and how this may have inconvenienced you. I hope to be able to explain the reasons for our actions and our decision on this matter.

The Contract of Insurance for the vehicle P192PLR was agreed between Mrs H Jamieson and her insurance company, Direct Line Insurance. This agreement was based on ‘utmost good faith’. That is to say that when a contract is taken out customers are obliged to disclose any detail which may be of importance to the insurers whether or not it is requested. At the point of inception of the policy, Mrs Jamieson would have been asked, and confirmed, if she was the registered keeper and vehicle owner. We therefore, under the principle of ‘utmost good faith’, had no reason to question this information. Documentation to this effect was issued and the policyholder is asked to ensure that all information is correct. As this documentation was not challenged it is assumed to be correct and forms the basis of the contract.

Mrs Jamieson is our policyholder and we have to respect her wishes regarding how her policy is managed. After your call to report the theft of the vehicle we later received a further call from Mrs Jamieson requesting that we no longer discuss her policy with anybody but her. In relation to the terms of the Data Protection Act 1998, which we must abide by, if a policy holder requests that we only discuss their policy with them then we have to do this. This is the reason we were then unable to discuss the claim with you further. This is In accordance with Direct Line’s settlement process and the process was followed correctly. Once the claim was registered it was then validated and settled on a cash basis with the policyholder, Mrs Jamieson. The vehicle documents were then requested in order for us to take possession of the vehicle.

This case has been referred to our legal department and discussions have been held with Mrs Jamieson’s solicitors in order to make a final decision regarding the ownership of the vehicle. We have been informed that even though the vehicle was insured in Mrs Jamieson’s name you were the main user of the vehicle and we have no rights over the vehicle in question. It is on this basis that your V5 has been returned. The Motor Insurance Anti-Fraud and Theft Register (MIAFTR) has now been updated to confirm that the vehicle is no longer stolen. You have stated that you feel that you were intentionally tricked into sending in your V5 document so that we could retain it. I can assure you that this was not our intention. The V5 was requested in a genuine attempt for us to further investigate your complaint.

I hope I have been able to explain the reasons for our actions during Mrs Jamieson’s claim. I realise that from your perspective Direct Line were refusing to discuss the claim with you and attempting to take possession of your vehicle. This must have been both frustrating and confusing for which I apologise. More effort should have been made to clarify the ownership of the vehicle at an earlier stage.

We have no offers to make in regard to the depreciation of the car, your loan repayments or the storage of the vehicle, as it is not accepted that these costs were incurred as the result of our actions. However in recognition of any inconvenience caused to you I have arranged for a cheque to be sent to you for the sum of 200GBP which I hope you will accept with my best wishes.

I appreciate the time you have taken to make me aware of the problems you have experienced.

Yours sincerely

Chris Moat
Managing Director

Hmm, 200GBP? That only just covers the loan repayment on the car for the last 4 weeks. I find it hard to believe they say they’re not liable for the depreciation, storage and loans when they have admitted that they should have tried harder to ascertain who owns the car at the beginning.

Obviously I’m going to refuse this, it’s insulting.

I’ll post my reply to this next week.