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A LegalBeagles member has successfully defended legal proceedings issued by Allay Claims in court on Thursday.
This was a classic case of Allay claiming that the defendant electronically signed a Letter of Authority and Terms of Engagement after responding to a 'Free PPI Check' advert on Facebook, when the defendant did not in fact sign anything. As far as we are aware this is the first time that the notorious Allay digital signature issue has been contested in court.
In this case the defendant filled out the form on the advert and then received Letters of Authority and a contract in the post to sign & return. In the event she decided not to and eventually made the PPI claims herself. Somehow Allay were made aware by the bank that she had successfully made the claims and invoiced her for £1600.
In the judgment, below, the District Judge held that not only did the defendant not sign a contract as Allay had bogusly claimed, had she done so it would have been invalid in any event due to the absence of a cancellation form or a copy of the contract in a durable medium as required by distance selling regulations.
Although this is a County Court judgment and therefore does not set case law, it is indicative of how courts may view the issue and we hope that it gives confidence to others in a similar position who believe that they have been a victim of fraud.
The judgment also raises serious questions about the Financial Conduct Authority's regulation of Allay Claims. Although the FCA were fully aware of the widespread Facebook advert/digital signature issue and in fact banned Allay from conducting online promotions (albeit temporarily) in August 2019, they inexplicably granted Allay a full & permanent license to conduct claims management in February this year.
We have provided FCA with the judgment and invited them to revisit their decision.
This was a classic case of Allay claiming that the defendant electronically signed a Letter of Authority and Terms of Engagement after responding to a 'Free PPI Check' advert on Facebook, when the defendant did not in fact sign anything. As far as we are aware this is the first time that the notorious Allay digital signature issue has been contested in court.
In this case the defendant filled out the form on the advert and then received Letters of Authority and a contract in the post to sign & return. In the event she decided not to and eventually made the PPI claims herself. Somehow Allay were made aware by the bank that she had successfully made the claims and invoiced her for £1600.
In the judgment, below, the District Judge held that not only did the defendant not sign a contract as Allay had bogusly claimed, had she done so it would have been invalid in any event due to the absence of a cancellation form or a copy of the contract in a durable medium as required by distance selling regulations.
Although this is a County Court judgment and therefore does not set case law, it is indicative of how courts may view the issue and we hope that it gives confidence to others in a similar position who believe that they have been a victim of fraud.
The judgment also raises serious questions about the Financial Conduct Authority's regulation of Allay Claims. Although the FCA were fully aware of the widespread Facebook advert/digital signature issue and in fact banned Allay from conducting online promotions (albeit temporarily) in August 2019, they inexplicably granted Allay a full & permanent license to conduct claims management in February this year.
We have provided FCA with the judgment and invited them to revisit their decision.
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