Terms of Business & Customer Charter

This document contains important information about the services we provide and how we transact business with you. This includes a £5m limitation of Burrow Humphreys liability. Please read carefully and retain.

  1. Regulation. Burrow Humphreys Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to sell general insurance products. We are an independent company owned by the directors, no outside organisations or individuals having a holding, direct or otherwise. Our Financial Services Register number is 308504 and you can check this by visiting the FCA’s website, www.fca.gov.uk/register or by contacting the FCA on 0800 111 6768.
  2. Commission. You are entitled at any time to request information regarding commission we receive as a result of placing your insurance business plus income we earn in connection with arranging instalment facilities.We usually receive a commission based on a percentage of the premium you pay from the insurance provider with whom we place your business, and in such a case, this will be paid to us either when we are in receipt of cleared funds from you (or the premium finance company, if one has been used) or, when the insurer has received cleared funds from us in respect of the premium due under your policy. The individual agreements we have with each insurer will determine which of the two methods above is used to make this transfer of commission. We also receive commission for arranging finance agreements for the payment of insurance premiums and this is also a percentage of the individual loan and paid to us directly by the premium finance provider. We may also receive a commission or fee for passing introductions to other professional firms.Other Earnings. We may also earn income in a number of different ways. Some
    insurers may provide efficiency fees or production over-riders periodically to
    reflect the benefit of receiving large amounts of business from a single source that
    has been handled promptly and efficiently. Occasionally certain insurers may wish to
    reflect the profitability of our account with them by way of payment to us. Burrow
    Humphreys Limited may also earn interest in the processing and collection of
    premiums.
  3. Our Service To You. In arranging insurance for our customers we act as an independent intermediary and act on your behalf when advising on and arranging your insurance. Our service includes:-
    • Advising you on your insurance needs. N.B. All sales include advice as to the suitability of the contract. We do not offer information only. Advice is based on a fair & personal analysis of a sufficiently large number of insurance contracts available on the market to enable us to make a personal recommendation.
    • Arranging your insurance cover with insurers to meet your requirements.
    • Helping you with any ongoing changes you have to make.
    • Providing you with a claims service as described in Paragraph 13.
    We offer general insurance products and have access to a wide range of insurers for most commercial and personal insurance policies. We will give you details of these insurers when we discuss your individual requirements.Please note however that, for Travel Insurance, we only use a carefully selected panel of insurers:-
    • AXA
    • Ageas (formerly Fortis)
    • AIG
    • Syndicate DTW 1991 at Lloyds
    • AllClear
    Our Motor Uninsured Loss Recovery and Family Legal Expenses policies are underwritten by just one insurer, AmTrust Europe Ltd. Our GAP Insurance and loss adjusters fees policies are also underwritten by just one insurer, Tokio Marine Kiln and Hiscox respectively.
  4. Limitation of Liability. We are not liable for direct or indirect losses, damages, costs or expenses incurred or suffered by you as a result of or in connection with any service we provide unless arising directly from our negligence, wilful default or fraud (or that of our directors, officers or employees).In respect of losses, damages, costs or expenses incurred or suffered as a result of our negligence, our total liability to you for such losses shall not exceed £5m.Nothing in this document will however limit our liability for death or personal injury resulting from our negligence, neither does it exclude or restrict any duty or liability that we may owe to you under the regulatory system as defined in FCA rules.We will not be liable to you for any partial or non-performance of our obligations to you by reason of any cause beyond our control including without limitation breakdown, malfunction or failure of transmission, communication or computing facilities, industrial action, natural causes, Acts and Regulations of government bodies or authorities or the failure of any third party to perform its obligations to us.
  5. Professional Indemnity Insurance. Cover is mandatory under FCA regulations and Burrow Humphreys Limited carries insurance which exceeds these requirements, currently £5m (in line with Limitation of Liability Clause 4 above).
  6. Duty of Fair Presentation. It is important that Commercial Customers understand that from 12th August 2016 Commercial policies are subject to the new Insurance Act 2015. Policies incepted or renewed after that date fall under the terms of the new Act, although there is an opportunity to contract out of part or all of the terms of the Act.You are required under the Act to make a fair presentation of the risk to Insurers which discloses every material circumstance which you know or ought to know relating to the risk to be insured. A circumstance is material if it would influence the judgement of a prudent insurer in determining whether to provide insurance for the risk and, if so, on what terms. This duty not only applies before cover is placed, but also when it is renewed and at any time that it is varied.What you know: You will be expected to know any information which is known by individuals who are: (a) part of your senior management (i.e individuals who play a significant role in the making of decisions about how your activities are to be managed or organised); (b) responsible for arranging your insurance (i.e. individuals who participate on your behalf in the process of procuring your insurance in any capacity).What you ought to know: In addition, you are expected to know any information that should reasonably have been revealed by a reasonable search of information available to you (whether the search is conducted by making enquiries or by other means). This could include any information held within your organisation or by any other person.Clear and Accessible disclosure: The disclosure you give must be made in a manner which would be reasonably clear and accessible to a prudent insurer.Every material representation of a matter of fact which you make must be substantially correct and every material representation as to a matter of expectation or belief must be made in good faith.Failure to comply with the duty of fair presentation could mean that the policy is void or that Insurers are not liable to pay all or part of your claim(s).If you are in any doubt as to what may constitute a fair presentation, please feel free to contact us and we will endeavour to assist you.From 6th April 2013 Consumers (Non-Commercial Customers, where the main purpose of the contract is for private use) are subject to the Consumer Insurance (Disclosure and Representations) Act 2012. Although Consumers, unlike Commercial Customers, no longer have a duty in law to declare material facts, Consumers still have a duty to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation, and should answer all questions honestly and to the best of their knowledge. If you don’t, the policy may be cancelled, or treated as if it never existed, or your claim rejected or not fully paid.You are advised to keep copies of documentation sent to or received from us for your own protection. Please do consult us if you are in doubt on any aspect.
  7. Awareness of Policy Terms. 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 that is the basis of the insurance contract you have purchased. If you are in doubt over any of the policy terms and conditions, please seek our advice promptly.
  8. Customer Protection Information. It is our intention to provide you with a high level of customer service at all times. If there are occasions when we do not meet your standards, please contact a director, either verbally or in writing, who will take details of your concerns. We will promptly acknowledge in writing, advising you who is dealing with your concerns and attempt to address your concerns within three working days. If our investigations take longer, we will keep you informed, explain our position and provide timescales for a full response. It is our expectation that most complaints will receive a final response within a maximum of eight weeks. If we cannot satisfy your complaint you may be entitled to refer it to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).As an alternative you may be entitled to bypass our complaints procedures and complain direct to the FOS providing we have given our consent. In such circumstances the FOS will advise you on your options and how to proceed.Please refer to www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk or telephone 0800 023 4567 (free for people phoning from a @fixed line, for example a landline at home) or 0300 123 9123 (free for mobile phone users paying monthly charge for calls to numbers starting 01 or 02) for more information.
  9. Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). We are also covered by the FSCS. You may be entitled to compensation from the scheme if we cannot meet our obligations.Further information about the compensation scheme is available from the FSCS at 10th Floor, Beaufort House, 15 St. Botolph Street, London, EC3A 7QU, by referring to www.fscs.org.uk or by contacting the FSCS on 0800 678 1100 or 020 7741 4100.
  10. Charges. We may apply an administration fee (min £30) to each policy arranged or renewed (details will always be advised to you in advance). We may also charge a £10 fee for handling mid-term amendments or mid-term cancellations. We do not, however, make a charge for duplicate Certificates or duplicate No Claims Bonus proofs.
  11. Cooling Off Period. We will give you enough information and help so you can make an informed decision before you make a final commitment to buy your insurance policy. However, you will have 14 days to change your mind and cancel the insurance contract from the date you receive the policy documentation. N.B. This does not apply to Commercial Customers or mixed use policies (i.e. policies covering both private and commercial risks).
  12. Premiums and Financial Aspects. In order to be able to offer you credit facilities, we were registered under the Consumer Credit Act, Licence Number 655552. From the 1st April 2014 this activity has been regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority from whom we have permission to conduct Credit Broking and Debt Administration.We accept payment by cheque, BACS or cash. Cash payments are, however, limited to a maximum of £1,000. Payment terms will be agreed prior to cover commencing, subject to a maximum of 30 days.You may also be able to spread your payments through insurers’ instalment schemes or a credit scheme that we have arranged with a third party finance provider. We will give you full information about your payment options when we discuss your insurance in detail. It should, however, be noted that, if cover is withdrawn because an instalment has not been paid, we do not accept any liability arising from this action.We may keep certain documents, such as your insurance policy documents or Certificate, while we are waiting for full payment of premiums. In these circumstances, we will ensure that you receive full details of your insurance cover and will provide you with any documents that you are required to have by law.We hold monies received from customers in an FCA approved statutory trust account, interest earned on the account being retained by ourselves. We then remit such monies to insurers in line with our agreements with them. On a return premium, we repay commission on the amount to your insurer and this may be deducted from the final amount refunded to you. If a policy is cancelled, we will refund any return premium due (after deduction of commission).A statutory trust client bank account only allows us to use the money held in trust on behalf of a customer for paying that customer’s premium to an insurance company and to pay premium refunds we receive from an insurance company to the customer, once the premium has been received from that insurance company. We cannot use that customer’s money to pay another customer’s premium or refund. We do not pay any interest on premiums held by us in the course of arranging and administering your insurance, unless, in the case of consumer transactions we receive more than £20 per transaction, and then we will ask for your permission to retain the interest. Unless you tell us otherwise, you are consenting to us holding your money in this way.In arranging your insurance we may employ the services of other intermediaries who are regulated by the FCA and your premium may be passed to these intermediaries for payment to insurers. These firms are also required to hold clients’ money in a separate trust account. We will also inform you if at any time we are required to pass your premium to firms that operate outside the UK where the protection may be different. Should you not wish us to pass premiums to a firm outside of the UK, please inform us.
  13. Claims. When we receive notification of an incident that may give rise to a claim under your policy, we will inform the insurer as soon as possible. We will also offer a service to assist you with any claim you need to make, including, if required, the recovery of any uninsured losses you may incur.It is also important that you follow the claims reporting requirements of your policies. Failure to do so could lead to your claim being rejected.Ministry of Justice (MOJ) Reforms in respect of Personal Injury Claims were introduced in April 2013 in an effort to reduce lawyers’ costs and combat the compensation culture. The key point to be aware of is that insurers have a very limited timescale to admit or dispute liability for injury claims. It is therefore vital that full and accurate information of any incident is provided by you immediately and full co-operation and assistance given to insurers thereafter with any investigation.
  14. Confidentiality. All personal information about our customers is treated as Private and Confidential. To this end we were registered under the Data Protect Act 1998. This legislation was replaced on 25th May 2018 by the General Data Protection Regulation which we undertake to comply with in all our dealings. N.B. Please see separate Privacy Policy.You should also be aware that insurers pass information to the Claims and Underwriting Exchange and the Motor Insurance Anti-Fraud and Theft Register. The aim is to check information provided and prevent fraudulent claims.We are also required to comply with financial sanctions legislation by checking clients against the UK Consolidated Financial Sanctions List maintained by HM Treasury. This involves passing your details to BIBA approved facility SanctionsSearch.com.Motor Insurance details are added to the Motor Insurance Database run by the Motor Insurers’ Information Centre which has been formed to help identify uninsured drivers and may be searched by the Police to help confirm who is insured to drive. In the event of an accident the database may be used by insurers and the Motor Insurers Bureau to identify relevant policy information.
  15. Policies Transferred to Burrow Humphreys. Where a customer has elected to transfer policies to our care which were previously arranged by other parties, we are not liable for losses arising from errors, omissions, gaps in cover or advice not provided by us. In such cases, with your co-operation, we would wish to review the cover provided by such policies with you as soon as possible after our appointment .
  16. Insurer Security. As brokers we utilise only insurers authorised to transact business in the UK and which also have appropriate financial strength ratings from independent rating agencies Standard & Poors, A.M. Best, Fitch, or Moody’s. These can of course only be of guidance at inception or renewal of your policy as financial strength ratings may change during the period of insurance and are therefore beyond our control. We cannot therefore guarantee the ability of an insurer to meet policyholder obligations. If you have any concerns about the security offered, please contact us.
  17. Acceptance of this Terms of Business Agreement. This Terms of Business Agreement does not affect your normal legal rights. The Agreement will apply to all transactions, including renewals. The Agreement sets out the entire Agreement between the customer and Burrow Humphreys Limited, and replaces any previous Agreement which has been issued.
  18. Termination of this Agreement. You or we may terminate our authority to act on your behalf at any time without penalty. Notice of this termination must be given in writing. The termination will be without prejudice to the completion of transactions already initiated.
  19. Further Information. If you have any queries arising from this Terms of Business Agreement or require additional advice or information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Date: August 2021