TERMS OF BUSINESS for MICHAEL PAVEY LTD t/a

Pavey Group

 

The Financial Services Authority

The FSA is an independent watchdog that regulates financial services. It requires us to give you certain information, some of which is contained within this document. You should use this document to help you decide if our services are right for you.

Our Service

In arranging insurance for our customers, we act as an Independent Intermediary. Our service includes advising you and assessing 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 assist you with making a claim.

IMPORTANT - to ensure that your insurance is renewed, payment of the premium must be tendered by you before the expiry date of the policy. No days of grace are given, unless specifically arranged and agreed by your insurer. Certain documentation will not be released to you until payment of the premium has been made in full.

Please note that our Uninsured Loss Recovery Scheme and Breakdown cover are not insurance products and are not covered by Financial Services Authority (FSA) Regulations. We will give you full details of any such arrangements before you make any commitment on any product we offer you.

What will you have to pay us for our services?

We will provide you with full details of any charges we may make prior to incurring them. A copy of our current tariff of charges will be provided for you if requested. If you are a Commercial Customer, you may request details of commissions we receive for placing insurance with Product Providers. We also receive revenue based on the volume/profitability of insurance placed with a given insurer over a specific period. These payments recognise the services that we provide to the Insurer over the given period and are not directly related to the service we provide you.

Who regulates us?

Michael Pavey Ltd of Berwyn House, 70-72 Abbey Road, Torquay TQ2 5NH is authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Our FSA Register Number is 308106. Our permitted business is:

* advising on non-investment insurance contracts

* arranging non-investment insurance contracts

* assisting you in arranging non-investment insurance contracts

* dealing as an agent in non-investment insurance contracts

* assisting in the administration and performance of a non-investment insurance contract

You can check this information on the Financial Services Authority's Register by visiting their website at www.fsa.gov.uk/register or by contacting the Financial Services Authority on 0845 606 1234.

Through this regulation we are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (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. Further information about compensation scheme arrangements is available from www.FSCS.org.uk.

If you have a complaint

We are committed to providing you with an exceptional level of service and customer care. We realise that things do go wrong and there may be occasions when you feel that we have not provided the service you expected. If you feel you have cause for complaint, write, telephone or call into the office that arranged your insurance. Advise our staff of the situation and be prepared to give them: -

* your policy or claim number and the type of policy you hold

* a clear and concise reason for your complaint

Our aim will be to resolve your complaint within one working day of receiving all the above information. Where that is not possible, we will write to you within five working days and: -

* confirm who is handling your complaint

* confirm when we will reply to you

* provide you with a copy of our complaints procedure

If, when you receive our response, you are still unhappy, please confirm your reasons in writing to the local branch director to consider the matter further. The local director will then either offer you an alternative solution or send you a final decision letter. When we write to you with our final decision, we will enclose a leaflet telling you how to contact the Financial Ombudsman Service, or independent arbitrator, should you still be unsatisfied.

The FOS is an independent body that arbitrates on complaints about general insurance products and other financial services. It will only consider your complaint if: -

* we have issued you with our final decision letter

* your business (if applicable) turnover is less than £1,000,000

Note that you have six months from the date of our final response in which to refer your complaint to the FOS. Referral to the FOS will not affect your right to take legal action.

Your duty as a client

It is your responsibility to provide complete and accurate information to insurers at inception, throughout the life of your policy and when you renew. Failure to disclose information 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 the 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. If you are in any doubt about whether information is material, you should disclose it.

When a policy is issued you are strongly advised to read it carefully, as it is that document, the schedule and any Certificate of Insurance, which is a legal contract. If you are in doubt as to any of the policy terms or conditions, please seek our advice promptly, as any breach of any terms and 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.

Confidentiality

We will treat all your information as private and confidential to us and anyone else providing your insurance even when you are no longer a customer. We will not give anyone else personal information about you except: -

* when you ask us to or give permission

* where we have to under FSA Regulation

* where we have to by law

* to credit reference agencies for the purpose of arranging payments by instalments

Under the Data Protection Act 1998, your have the right to see personal information we hold about you on our records. You may request a copy of our records by sending a written request to us. Due to the administration involved, we reserve the right to charge a fee, which will be dependent upon the amount of work involved, but will be capped at £25 for this service.

Premiums and Financial aspects

Premiums that we collect from you will be segregated into and held in a Client Money Bank Account, which is set up as a trust governed by FSA rules. The client money will be held by us as trustee on your behalf. This means that once client money is segregated into the Client Money Bank Account, it falls into our legal ownership but remains in the beneficial ownership of customers whose premiums are deposited in the Account. If we become insolvent, the terms of the trust dictate that customers will have prior claim on the client money in the Account according to their respective interests in the client money. Under some Terms of Business agreements with Insurers as soon as premiums are paid to us by you, they are treated as if you had paid them direct to the Insurer, thereby providing you with a further financial safeguard. We do not pay interest on monies held in the Client Money Account pending payment to the Insurers concerned. We receive commission from the premium that you pay to us. We shall only withdraw commission after we have received the premium from you and in accordance with FSA regulations and agreements that we hold with Insurers. In order to be able to offer you credit facilities, we are registered under the Consumer Credit Act and our Licence No. is 515554. We normally accept a payment by cash, guaranteed cheque or credit/debit cards.

You may be able to spread your payments through insurers' instalment schemes, a credit scheme with a third party finance provider or a facility we have arranged ourselves. We will give you full information about your payment options when we discuss your insurance in detail.