This report publishes our work to date on the automatic renewal of fixed-term bonds. We asked 30 firms that offer fixed-term bonds for details about their contracts and their practices regarding automatic renewal: this report outlines our concerns and the firms’ response to the feedback we gave them.
Why are we publishing this Thematic Review?
We are currently undertaking thematic work into automatic renewal, considering both:
- consumer contract terms; and
- firms’ practices regarding automatic renewal.
We have now completed one aspect of this work, which looked at the automatic renewal of fixed-term bond products. We continue our work into automatic renewal, currently focusing on home and motor insurance policies, but thought it would be helpful to publish our work to date. This is not our final view on this area and we expect to publish our follow-up report in 2014.
Who is this TR aimed at?
This report is relevant to all firms that offer fixed-term bonds and their trade associations.
It may also be of interest to consumers and consumer groups.
Thematic Review 13/4 - Automatic renewal of fixed-term bonds
What are the next steps?
We are conducting some further work into automatic renewal, now focusing on home and motor insurance policies. The work will build on this thematic review to help us decide when to intervene to ensure that customers are treated fairly when their financial products are automatically renewed. We expect to publish our follow-up report on automatic renewal in 2014.