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I have had car insurance with Admiral for the past eight years and never claimed. Last September, I bought a new car and, over the phone, changed from a single to a dual car policy. Shortly after, I received a letter saying that I owed an outstanding balance of £525. There was no explanation.
Admiral claims that I didn't notify them of three points on my licence from going through a red light in November 2004. I am absolutely adamant that I did tell them when I renewed the policy in September 2005 and remember being told that this was not a "serious" conviction.
EP, London
Margaret: Admiral has looked for every call you made to the company since your renewal in 2005. Not all of them were recorded and some of those that were have been corrupted. But Admiral does say that you are told to check and notify any changes in the annual renewal statements. Your convictions were not mentioned and you hadn't corrected this. Admiral says the first it knew of them was from your call this year, which is why it backdated so much in additional premiums.
But it admits that this demand went out a month after your call, without any explanation. It also found that, although a letter was sent following your second complaint call, no one had read the team leader's notes left after the first, so staff did not follow the correct procedure.
It knows that you phoned in 2005 but is unable to listen to that recording. So it accepts that you did declare the convictions then, and has waived the extra £525 premium.
How can I be £1,366 worse off on a with-profits policy?
I have a with-profits policy with MGM Advantage maturing on 23 October. On 12 September, I asked how much the fund was worth and was told £10,649, made up of £9,894 plus a terminal bonus of £755.
I asked if a market value reduction (MVR) might be applied and was categorically told it would not, as the next review was not due until after my policy expired. I decided to keep the policy to maturity. On 23 October, I received an investment summary showing the maturity value was just £10,006, even though I had paid another £150 in premiums since the quotation. I was £793 worse off.
But the very next day, I received another letter saying an MVR of £573 had been applied and I would now get only £9,433 with no terminal bonus.
I am now £1,366 worse off than I was in September.
BP, Maidstone
Margaret: With-profits policies are supposed to take the shocks out of stock market investment but they are now a gamble when you can lose so much money so quickly. MGM says the problem is that you have misunderstood what sort of policy you have. It is easy to see why you did.
This isn't a 10-year policy but a whole-of-life policy which, of course, has no end date, so it did not mature on 23 October as you expected. If it had, you would have avoided the MVR because MVRs are never applied at maturity. Instead, it has a "funding term" of initially 10 years. And the "terminal bonus" was, apparently, no such thing but instead a "bonus payable on termination" paid, if it is, when policyholders end their policies.
MGM has the right to hold emergency reviews at any time and, because of the stockmarket collapse, did so on 20 October. It immediately implemented the penalty. It says you could have changed your mind about cashing in but chose to surrender, anyway. That was before you understood how the policy worked.
Do I have to pay to return faulty goods to eBay?
I bought two metronomes on eBay, paid through PayPal, but they arrived damaged. The seller agreed to a refund but said I had to pay to post them back. I claimed from PayPal but it would not consider a compensation claim until I had paid to return them. Under the Sale of Goods Act, I do not have to pay for the return of damaged or defective items. Nor should a refund be conditional on returning the goods at my expense.
C-AV, London
Margaret: PayPal and eBay have a get out. Ebay is a market place, not a retailer, so your rights under the Sale of Goods Act are against the metronome seller, not eBay or PayPal. Under the Sale of Goods Act, sellers carry the risk for goods until they pass to the buyers at delivery, but only if the seller is carrying out a business and the buyer is a consumer. It is reasonable for a company to ask you to return a damaged item but you should be entitled to a refund of the cost. But when it is a private sale, there is no set rule. If the seller had not agreed to a refund, you would have had to pay the return postage and might still be refused a refund by PayPal. But, as a goodwill gesture, it has refunded the cost of the metronomes without you having to return them at all.
Quoted £100 and €3 for opening a French account
My son was advised to open a French bank account for his year studying in France but, as he already had an HSBC student account, tried to open an HSBC account in France. The call centre said it would cost £100 through HSBC's international department but the HSBC France website gives details of a student account for €3.75 a month.
AT, Cannock
Margaret: Head office has spoken to your branch, which has offered to write a letter to take into a French HSBC branch stating your son already has a UK account. There would then be no problem opening an account once he arrived.
Trying to put an end to this pension runaround
On my 65th birthday in September, I telephoned the Pensions Service to claim the State pension which I had deferred from age 60. I was told that I had accrued £16,500 in benefits. I posted the application forms and was promised a "choices" letter to claim the lump sum. On 2 October, the first payment was made into my bank but no "choices" letter had arrived. I called to ask for it, but was then sent the wrong form.
I phoned four more times. Eventually, someone said their records showed that the letter had been sent on 22 September - I thought my records had been checked in the previous calls. The Pensions Service is making it difficult to make a legitimate claim.
SO, Reading
Margaret: The Pensions Service apologises and says it delivers pensions, benefits and forecasts to 15 million customers and occasionally things can go wrong. The service is trying to discover why you were given the run-around. At least someone has now offered to organise your claim for a lump sum.
• Email Margaret Dibben at money.writes@observer.co.uk or write to Margaret Dibben, The Observer, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU and include a telephone number. Do not enclose SAEs or original documents. Letters are selected for publication and we cannot give personal replies. The newspaper accepts no legal responsibility for advice.
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