How an Aussie woman claimed $17,000 she didn’t know she was owed.
A Claimo customer from Adelaide has received a $17,000 cash payout through her junk insurance refund she had no idea she was eligible for.
She is just one of millions of Australians eligible for cash payout from junk insurance.
Following a banking royal commission finding in 2019, financial institutions were ordered to set aside $10 billion to refund people who had purchased junk insurance. Junk insurance refers to coverage that is either unnecessary or worthless.
However, Peg McCann says she had no idea she had been paying insurance on her Westpac bank card that she didn’t need for an entire decade.
After contacting Claimo, an investigation was launched on Peg’s behalf.
“All I had to do was send off an email and then sit and wait to hear back,” she told 7NEWS.com.au.
Just a few weeks later, Claimo had processed her refund application.
“When I got that call, it was like winning the lottery,” she said.
Peg said she was ecstatic to find out she was owed a $17,000 refund, and decided to put the money toward something very special.
“I had been planning my first overseas trip just prior to the pandemic,” she explained.
“But when COVID hit I lost my job as I was just working casually.”
“So all my travel savings had to go towards keeping me afloat during that time.”
Peg says now she has received the refund she is planning a trip to Italy, in the hopes of seeing Pompeii.
However, although Peg was elated at the news of the refund, she felt confused about why she had been paying the insurance in the first place.
“I called years ago about the insurance I was being charged because it seemed like an awful amount of money,” she said.
“But they told me it was something I needed, and they are the experts, so I just went along with it.”
Peg said she recommended that anyone who believed there may even be “a small chance” they could receive a refund should contact Claimo.
Meanwhile, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission says remediation is still available for millions of Australians for “fees for no-service misconduct or non-compliant advice” as well as ” junk insurance” cashback payments.
A 2019 report from the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry revealed millions of people had been duped into buying junk insurance.
New ASIC data released in September 2022 estimates a further $1.6 billion is yet to be paid to about 2.7 million consumers for remediation for both junk insurance and non-compliant advice.
“Our guidance puts the onus on industry to get on with fair and timely remediations – returning the money they owe to wronged consumers,” ASIC deputy chair Karen Chester said.
“To date, ASIC has needed to oversee large-scale remediations, to ensure affected consumers were treated fairly and received the compensation they were entitled to.”
Claimo CEO Nathan Mortlock said the most common reason people bought junk insurance was because they were told it was necessary.
“A lot of the time they were told they had to have that insurance to get that home loan back in the ‘90s and also the ‘00s, and we know that’s actually not the case,” he said.
How to Start your Claim
The first stage of the process would be to check your loan or credit card documentation. Don’t worry if you no longer have your documents, Claimo will request these for you.
We will send an information request to your banks and financial institutions to see if you have been charged for add-on or junk insurance.
If you have been charged for junk insurance, one of Claimo’s claims specialists will give you a call to discuss your eligibility. When financial firms confirm that you have not been charged for the insurance, we will close that part of your enquiry. We don’t charge if you do not have insurance.
Our junk insurance claims managers will give you regular updates as they come. For more information about junk insurance, please read our full junk insurance guide here.
