Van LineDirect Reviews 11,867

Extremely helpful and informative

**Update** We received a call from Charlie yesterday and we must say he was professional and listened intently to our concerns and reasons. We have every confidence that Charlie will look at what happened in our case and make any adjustments needed to their processes internally. In view of this we have amended our rating to 3. It would have been amended to 5 stars after speaking to Charlie, but we cannot forget the service we had before his intervention.
Untrained rude staff, rip off exit fees, almost impossible to cancel policy - nothing is good about this company and they a leave a taste of something not quite right with this business.
We had a policy for 2 years and the only annoyance were their sales calls, trying to get us to upgrade to things like excess protection etc. These calls happen monthly, but most of the time they put the phone down when you answer.
This week we purchased a new van and called for a quote/transfer of policy. It takes on average 25 minutes to get through to any department. I was firstly put through to the ‘customer experience’ team’ . Quite probably the rudest woman I have ever spoken to. When it became apparent she good not transfer the policy I asked to be transferred to sales - I then had to wait on the line for 5 minutes before she would transfer me as she ‘was adding notes’, which I had to sit and listen to her typing. I then of course had the obligatory 25 minute wait for the sales department to answer. Eventually I spoke with Lewis, who was fantastic. He was polite, knowledgeable and professional, a total contrast to the dreadful customer experience lady. The process from start to finish was a massive phone call of 1 hour 48 minutes!
We sourced insurance for the new van elsewhere and called Van Line the next day to cancel the policy on the van we were selling. This was the worst case of customer service I have encountered ever. And I would never go anywhere near this company again because of it and feel it was nothing short of sharp practice to do all they can to prevent you cancelling your policy. Let alone their fees of which you get no breakdown or receipt for!
Phone call 1 - 28 minute wait, cannot help as you are not authorised on the account. You must be mistaken as I am and have spoken on the account over the past two years. Can you check? She put the phone down!
Phone call 2 - 23 minutes wait. Answered and immediately put the phone down before I could speak
Phone call 3 - same as above. Wondered have they blocked my number?
Phone call 4 - I used a different mobile and this time, after 17 minutes, the call was answered and not put down. Which confirmed they had blocked my usual mobile. Went through to sales as the day before they had been so helpful - no, we cannot help you. Rude, dismissive, over sensitive and not trained at all in customer service (Rhys). Asked for complaints and spoke to a lovely man called Samuel. He was really nice but again condors that even though I had authority to make changes that involved them earning more revenue, like the excess protection, I had no authority to cancel the policy.
My husband called them when he finished work on site. His wait on the phone was 37 minutes. He too got through to the rude customer experience department, who, once they realise you are cancelling and do not want a new policy with them, their rudeness intensifies. We ended up paying £164 to cancel the policy, of which we have no idea what these charges are for and have received no receipt or breakdown. We were just happy to pay this amount to get rid of having to deal with this terrible terrible company. Needless to say, do. It rely on your policy schedule to be accurate. It says you can cancel your policy by email / you cannot. It says your cancellation fee is £45. It is not. But you will probably never know what you have paid for to cancel.

Whtch out they get involved with Close Brothers finance so you know you will get ripped off

Clear and professional. Good Personality and friendly. Great service.

Very informative and friendly

Almost fraudulent, took full payment from my bank over 16 days before renewal date. I had also ticked the DO NOT Automatically Renew box.
Then you have to wait 1/2 hour plus and speak to multiple people to get it refunded which told takes 5-7 days, email says 10 days.
Not the way to do business and I won’t be ever using this company again.
Just another quote, same cover - nearly £200 cheaper.
My main issue is with you taking payment a few day’s after the renewal and 16 days before the renewal start date.
What’s OK about taking full payment over two weeks before the start date?
Also absolutely no notification other than when it was too late to stop it.
This is not the way you should be doing business.
I will be contacting my MP about this.
You have my email if you want to contact me.

It is so much easier when you can speak to a person and not a machine. All the staff I spoke to were polite, knowledgeable and helpful throughout the whole process.

So I called in twice to terminate my policy. As I work on a secured site and can't take phone calls I asked to be emailed the final amount to settle the account. After 3 days no response. I terminated my debit orde. They ten started emailing me stating my policy will be terminated on the 28/01/1940. I then called them again and explained again my request. I was then eventually emailed an amount of £58. I then paid the amount and emailed back to them the copy of payment and confirmed full and final payment. I then was emailed back stating there was still a balanced owed. I then called them today and after hold on as the person who answered my call couldn't work out what was the story. I was told a manager would call me back. I then explained to the young lady, that I would on a secured site so can't do phone calls and that they needed to email me. Out of total dispair I have gone to a temp insurance site to cover my Pickup until the new insurance covers it as these people don't have a clue what they are doing. Avoid them Avoid them. By the way they were not cheap £281 where other insurance companies same cover £70 per month. Total Cowboys!

Same as most complaints. High cancellation fees. High fees for adding drivers. Make money from all aspects.

Customer service is also quite appalling at times. Tried to cancel by email and no reply. tried twice by ohone and finally rang the new sales line to get put through.

Wanted to add a new driver to my policy for one of the vehicles, they said i would have to wait 2 years before i could add him as he was a new driver, unbelievable. fancy website doesn't work, bot is awful, cant get through on the phone. I dread to think whats its like to sort an accident out. one of the worst companies ive dealt with. Avoid

Worst service ever.
Customer service haven’t got a clue what’s going on. Been lied to messed about and robbed by this company. Strongly don’t recommend using this company.
Nothing was resolved to my satisfaction after taking 3 months to sort the insurance claim and loss of earnings … you wavered a cancellation fee! Not what I’d say was resolved. Ombudsman has taken the case on.

Hi

We have tried to contact you many times and your company is impossible to contact.

We rang not last week the week before on a Wednesday and Thursday but your systems were down and we requested 2 call backs and you failed to return our calls your emails bounce back.

We wanted to change the vehicle your office suggested we arrange a new policy and cancel the other as he couldn’t say when your systems would be up and running.

So we arranged alternative cover elsewhere as suggested so we would like to cancel the policy and ask for a fund.

Spoke to such a nice helpful guy when I phoned for quote on my van insurance the guys name was Bradley was very impressed with him an he got me a good quote was very happy indeed

Two times I put in for insurance and each time I was given a completely different quote once they had already taken my money. First quote was £107, then when I called to validate my insurance it went up to over £200. Albeit I did accidentally put in slightly wrong information but not to anything to warrant over £100 difference in my quote. I argued my case and managed to cancel it and got my deposit back and re applied online and found it for £98.99, paid the deposit then had to validate it again with all the correct details, my vehicle on compare the market was valued at 15910 and on the phone I said it was worth around 16000, they then said I gave the false information and my monthly quotes went up by almost £100 again. At this point it felt to me like they were pulling numbers from nowhere and finding any excuse to add money onto my quote saying I should’ve made sure everything was correct which I thought I had.
I have gone back into compare the market and made sure I put everything correct as they were telling me too and I’m still getting the same quote of £98.99. I would like a phone number or an email I can send this evidence over too.

Phone operator was very helpful and knowledgeable helped me through the process of my policy would recommend to others

Everything went through smoothly

the customer service was really good, had some issues but did his best to sort out the issue.

Excellent service and very helpful :)