Re: Hamilton/HFC/Endeavour - Reclaim PPI
Hi Di,
Cor - you've gone into some serious effort here and I think your persistence might way pay off.
I thought I knew which way this one was going until I got to the application form bit, when it went off on a slightly different course as to who's liable here.
Looking at what's happened - there are 3 parties involved in this claim. Firstly, you've got Hamilton, who are the principal insurers of the policy. They may also be called the underwriters, but this is in relation to their risk for paying out a claim under the policy as opposed to underwiting the lenders risk to see if you're good for the money.
Secondly, you've got the lender, which is EPF - Endeavour Personal Finance. It's their money which you borrowed for the loan AND to purchase the PPI policy.
Finally, you've got the broker who brokered your credit application, which is Click Finance.
Under normal circumstances, the complaint would be directed to Click as they were the advisers in your case and they conducted, I presume, whats known as 'antecedental negotiations' - ie - there was a discussion between both parties, therefore, they were the ones responsible for the advice. Click have ceased trading, therefore, a claim is unable to be bought against them.
Now, to take this one further, you would have to prove a link between all three parties and prove that there was whats known as an Agent/Principal relationship between all of them. The link, very simply, is the payment of commission for the sale of the policies and as it's gone from one party to another and to another, therefore, I would say that Hamilton are the Principle and both EPF and Click acted as it's agents in the sale of the policy.
Whilst there is a clause in the lenders paperwork stating that the broker only acts on behalf of the borrower and they're not responsible for any of the brokers actions, I feel if the FOS dug a bit deeper, they might uncover something. With the upmost respect to the Adjudicator, it could be the case that they don't quite understand what they're doing or they don't understand the relationships that occur in this set of circumstances.
What I would ask the FOS to look at is, as payments of commissions have gone from Hamilton to EPF and on to Click, then there has to be legal contracts between them, because otherwise it would get messy when it came to payment, because, legally, none of them would have a leg to stand on if it came to a dispute about money, so there are bits of papers out there signed between Hamilton & EPF and between EPF and Click. I would be asking the FOS to confirm what do their contracts state and what capacity are they all acting in?
It appears to me as though Click were acting as agents of Endeavour in forwarding your details to them stating you wanted a loan. EPF can argue all day long that the broker wasn't their agent and there was a clause in the contract etc etc - just because theres a clause there - doesn't make it fair and legal.
Somewhere Di, theres paperwork out there stating what commissions are going to be paid, when they're payable and who's paying who - I would be asking the FOS have they seen these, and if not - why? because it'll prove exactly what capacity they're all acting as and it'll prove a link between Hamilton and Click.
The interesting bits are HFC's involvement and the Application Form.
Firstly, the link between HFC and EPF is they're wholly owened subsidiaries of HSBC bank. As they're Limited Companies, they're completely separate legal entities, so it does beg the question why the hell were HFC doing security checks for EPF. It could be something very innocent such as they were coping with backlogs etc - it could well be that both their security checks were the same and in busy periods they did each others etc, however, I can't for the life of me think why you've got speak with paperwork covered in HFC logos - because it's not their loan - it's EPF's.
Which also brings us on to the application form. I don't think that you've examined all avenues on this and it could well unlock the whole case. What was the agreement Click had with EPF? It would have been one of 2 relationships.
Did they act purely as a broker and purely pass your details onto the lender. Based on what's previously been posted - this could well be the case because if Click sent EPF a loan enquiry form stating a loan over 240 months and that was the extent of their involvement, and then it's changed to 300 months and PPI added - then EPF are responsible for the sale because when the form left Click, PPI wasn't included and it could only come from one place - and thats EPF.
The second thing to consider is were Click a packager for the loan? Being a packager means Click would have done the underwriting, carried out the valuation and employment checks, credit searches etc. If they were a packager for EPF then they were definately acting as their agents, and then we're back to Hamilton.
Hope this helps - and I wish you all the best with the case.
TBD
Hi Di,
Cor - you've gone into some serious effort here and I think your persistence might way pay off.
I thought I knew which way this one was going until I got to the application form bit, when it went off on a slightly different course as to who's liable here.
Looking at what's happened - there are 3 parties involved in this claim. Firstly, you've got Hamilton, who are the principal insurers of the policy. They may also be called the underwriters, but this is in relation to their risk for paying out a claim under the policy as opposed to underwiting the lenders risk to see if you're good for the money.
Secondly, you've got the lender, which is EPF - Endeavour Personal Finance. It's their money which you borrowed for the loan AND to purchase the PPI policy.
Finally, you've got the broker who brokered your credit application, which is Click Finance.
Under normal circumstances, the complaint would be directed to Click as they were the advisers in your case and they conducted, I presume, whats known as 'antecedental negotiations' - ie - there was a discussion between both parties, therefore, they were the ones responsible for the advice. Click have ceased trading, therefore, a claim is unable to be bought against them.
Now, to take this one further, you would have to prove a link between all three parties and prove that there was whats known as an Agent/Principal relationship between all of them. The link, very simply, is the payment of commission for the sale of the policies and as it's gone from one party to another and to another, therefore, I would say that Hamilton are the Principle and both EPF and Click acted as it's agents in the sale of the policy.
Whilst there is a clause in the lenders paperwork stating that the broker only acts on behalf of the borrower and they're not responsible for any of the brokers actions, I feel if the FOS dug a bit deeper, they might uncover something. With the upmost respect to the Adjudicator, it could be the case that they don't quite understand what they're doing or they don't understand the relationships that occur in this set of circumstances.
What I would ask the FOS to look at is, as payments of commissions have gone from Hamilton to EPF and on to Click, then there has to be legal contracts between them, because otherwise it would get messy when it came to payment, because, legally, none of them would have a leg to stand on if it came to a dispute about money, so there are bits of papers out there signed between Hamilton & EPF and between EPF and Click. I would be asking the FOS to confirm what do their contracts state and what capacity are they all acting in?
It appears to me as though Click were acting as agents of Endeavour in forwarding your details to them stating you wanted a loan. EPF can argue all day long that the broker wasn't their agent and there was a clause in the contract etc etc - just because theres a clause there - doesn't make it fair and legal.
Somewhere Di, theres paperwork out there stating what commissions are going to be paid, when they're payable and who's paying who - I would be asking the FOS have they seen these, and if not - why? because it'll prove exactly what capacity they're all acting as and it'll prove a link between Hamilton and Click.
The interesting bits are HFC's involvement and the Application Form.
Firstly, the link between HFC and EPF is they're wholly owened subsidiaries of HSBC bank. As they're Limited Companies, they're completely separate legal entities, so it does beg the question why the hell were HFC doing security checks for EPF. It could be something very innocent such as they were coping with backlogs etc - it could well be that both their security checks were the same and in busy periods they did each others etc, however, I can't for the life of me think why you've got speak with paperwork covered in HFC logos - because it's not their loan - it's EPF's.
Which also brings us on to the application form. I don't think that you've examined all avenues on this and it could well unlock the whole case. What was the agreement Click had with EPF? It would have been one of 2 relationships.
Did they act purely as a broker and purely pass your details onto the lender. Based on what's previously been posted - this could well be the case because if Click sent EPF a loan enquiry form stating a loan over 240 months and that was the extent of their involvement, and then it's changed to 300 months and PPI added - then EPF are responsible for the sale because when the form left Click, PPI wasn't included and it could only come from one place - and thats EPF.
The second thing to consider is were Click a packager for the loan? Being a packager means Click would have done the underwriting, carried out the valuation and employment checks, credit searches etc. If they were a packager for EPF then they were definately acting as their agents, and then we're back to Hamilton.
Hope this helps - and I wish you all the best with the case.
TBD
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