UKH

My Wife has had a an invitation to renew her Travel Insurance.
The email says "We've included a 5% renewal discount in your premium, meaning another years cover will cost £46.84"

All seems clear enough, yet when the email opens up it then has a button to get a renewal quote, which comes comes back with a quote of £68.02.

Now as I understand it, if a business advertises a price, that is an "offer" and if you cannot buy at that price, that is illegal. 

Anyone come across this issue.

In reply to Godwin:

From my Uni contract law days....

no. I think the original mail would be considered an "invitation to treat" and not an offer. I can't remember the case law but it relates to a sign in a shop showing one price vs the amount charged at the till. The offer is considered the action of offering to pay at the till and the acceptance is by the seller when they accept this

It could well be in violation of ASA rules tho

In reply to Godwin:

I believe that technically the business can either sell to you at the price they advertised/quoted or refuse to sell to you at all - they have the right to just say they will not to business with you.

If you want to buy the product, get in contact, explain the issue and demand that they sell to you for the quoted price and see what happens. It's not a huge difference and many companies would rather just get a little less money than waste time arguing and potentially lose brand value over it. Of course, it could always be a company like Ryanair, in which case I'd expect that if you even get a reply, it will just be a e-mail that says "f*** off".

However, being a cynical bastard, I'd say that if you look at one or more asterisks and links to terms and conditions of the quote, you will find weasel words that say something like "based on the most accurate info we have on you at the time of writing the e-mail, but does not constitute a binding quotation... etc. etc."

So take a punt at getting it for the cheaper price by complaining. I'd give you maybe 1 in 3 odds of getting the lower price.

In reply to balmybaldwin:

That is what I am wondering.

In reply to henwardian:

That is my understanding.

Well, I am rubbish at maths, but I make that a 50% increase.

There are asterisks as your years of wisdom have alerted you to, but they just say I must renew before expiry. I always watch out for the Asterisk.

Thats the plan, phone lines are not open until Monday and it is raining here so a little whine on UKC filled a moment.
When I phone though, I will not complain, I will engage and be all nice and charming, much more effective and well worth 10 minutes on the phone, after listening to the hold music on the speaker for 15 minutes.

I will report back.

In reply to Godwin:

It might be that the insurance has gone up by ~50%, but because they are nice, they will knock 5% off. They will shout about the discount, in the hope you don't notice the increase.

In reply to Godwin:

Yeah, but I mean, in terms of their business. Like if you are one customer in 10 million then giving you a cheaper product for one year makes no real difference for them (as long as they don't get everyone else following your lead). This is as opposed to a company with 6 clients who all have a huge account with the company, where a huge change in the size of one client account would have a big impact on the company. (although the flip side would be that in the latter case, you have more bargaining power as one of their clients).

Yeah, I put that poorly. What I meant was a) explain the issue and then b) state clearly what you want them to do (honour the lower price). Which is the time-honoured way of maximising your chance of satisfaction when you have a complaint.