Complaint Handling Procedure

Cobalt Underwriting Services Ltd is required by its Regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority, to have in place effective internal complaints handling procedures for handling complaints. For the purpose of our complaints procedure, a complaint is ‘any oral or written expression of dissatisfaction’, whether justified or not, from, or on behalf, of any person about the provision of, or failure to provide a financial service, which alleges that the person has suffered (or may suffer) financial loss, material distress or material inconvenience.

All Complaints will be referred to an authorised complaint handler who will be responsible for resolving the complaint in line with our complaints procedure.

The company will if required advise our Professional Indemnity Insurers.

Set out below are the procedures that we have put in place to ensure that complaints are handled fairly, effectively and promptly, and resolved at the earliest possible opportunity. Our objective is to resolve complaints internally, whenever possible, in order to minimise the number of cases where our clients need to refer the issue to a higher dispute resolution authority.

How to complain

If you should have any complaint about a general insurance related matter or about our service generally, we would ask you to make your complaint to The Complaints Officer at the following address:

By post:

The Complaints Officer

Cobalt Underwriting

1st Floor

63 St Mary Axe

London

EC3A 8AA

By email: enquiry@cobaltuw.com

By telephone: +44 (0)20 3642 0200

You may make your complaint at any time and by any reasonable means (for example by letter, telephone, e-mail or in person), although we would prefer you to contact us in writing, detailing the precise nature of your complaint, so that there can be no misunderstanding.

How we will respond to your complaint

Within two business days of receiving your complaint we will send you a written acknowledgement giving you the name and job title of the person who will be carrying out the investigation and when you can expect to receive a response.

In relation to oral complaints, the written acknowledgement will set out our understanding of the complaint and will invite you to contact us if our understanding is incorrect.

The acknowledgement letter will confirm that we will:-

a) provide regular updates on our progress;

b) advise that if our investigation has not been completed within 8 weeks from receipt of your complaint, we will write informing you why we are not yet in a position to resolve the complaint; and

c) advise that on completion of our investigation, we will write informing you of the outcome.

A copy of our complaints procedure will be forwarded to you with the acknowledgment letter.

Referring a complaint to another organisation

If a complaint is received whereby we have reasonable grounds to be satisfied that another organisation, including capacity providers, is solely or jointly responsible for the issue(s) raised, you will be referred to them promptly and in a durable medium. We will also inform you within two business days of the referral and provide you with the other organisation’s contact details.

Should the complaint relate to Lloyd’s business or any of their underwriters, the complaint will be referred to them promptly in accordance with the Lloyd’s Coverholder’s Complaints Referral Procedures set out in Appendix 1.

In case a complaint does not relate to any general insurance product or general insurance related service that we provide, we will advise you in writing within two business days of receipt of the complaint

If we are responsible on a joint basis, we will investigate the issues(s) that apply to us in line with our normal procedures.

Investigating complaints

All complaints will be investigated competently, diligently and impartially; be assessed fairly, consistently and promptly; and all relevant factors will be taken into account.

We will investigate the complaint and where possible, will consult with all parties involved whose actions or omissions gave rise to the complaint issue(s) raised.

We will ensure that if the authorised complaint handler is the subject of the complaint, the investigation will be conducted by another authorised complaint handler.

We will ensure that you are regularly kept informed of our progress with regards to the investigation into your complaint.

Any progress updates will include:

the reasons for any delay;

what further information / documents we require to resolve your complaint; and

when you may expect to receive a further update / our final response letter

We will work towards completing our investigation into a complaint within eight weeks of its receipt.

Within four weeks of receipt of your complaint we will:

Send you a written response informing you of the outcome of our investigation. This letter will detail the nature and terms of any offer of compensation which we may consider appropriate or, alternatively, our reasons for rejecting the complaint. At that time we will also inform you that if you are dissatisfied with our final response, you may refer your complaint to an Approved Dispute Resolution Facility.

or

Inform you in writing of the reasons why we are not yet in a position to resolve your complaint and indicate when we will make further contact.

Within eight weeks of receipt of your complaint we will:

Send you a written response informing you of:

– the outcome of our investigation;

– details of the investigation;

if relevant, any offer of remedial action(s) or the appropriate level of redress (or both), and the basis of calculation;

– a copy of the Financial Ombudsman Services (FOS) consumer leaflet and advise you that you may be able to refer the matter to the FOS but that this must be done within 6 months from the date of the final response letter, or you may lose your rights;

– detail the nature and terms of any offer of compensation which we may consider appropriate; and

– alternatively, our reasons for rejecting the complaint.

At that time we will also inform you that if you are dissatisfied with our final response, you may refer your complaint to an Approved Dispute Resolution Facility and or the FOS.

or

Inform you in writing of the reasons why we are still not in a position to make a final response to resolve your complaint and indicate when we expect to be able to make a final response. At that time we will also inform you that if you are dissatisfied with the delay, you may refer your complaint to an Approved Dispute Resolution Facility and or the FOS.

Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS)

A copy of the FOS’s consumer leaflet will be issued with the week 8 response letter.

You can contact them in writing at:

Financial Ombudsman Service

Exchange Tower

Harbour Exchange Square

London

E14 9GE

By telephone: 0800 0234 567 / 0300 123 9 123

By email:  complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk

Their website is www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk

Please note that there are certain limitations on what the FOS can investigate.

We will fully co-operate with the FOS to resolve any complaint against us and agree to be bound by any fair compensation awards made by them. Consideration will be given to any recommendations made which are above the FOS compensation award limit.

We undertake to pay any levies and case fees charged by the FOS promptly.

Record Keeping

Each complaint received, resolved or unresolved, will be recorded in our Complaints Log.

We will retain and maintain a full record of these complaints and their documentation for at least 3 years from the date the complaint is received.

The information will include:

· the name of the complainant;

· the date,

· nature and substance of the complaint; and

· the measures taken to resolve the complaint

Oversight and analysis of Complaint Handling

Our Operations Director has overall responsibility for complaints.

Every 6 months the Compliance Manager will undertake:

· root cause analysis of the Complaints Log; and

· analysis of cases where the Financial Ombudsman has disagreed with our final decision

The results will be used to identify any recurring and systematic problems, which will be addressed by training or change of procedure.

Results and remedial actions will be communicated to all employees.

Staff Understanding

All employees are made aware of our complaints policy, know where it is stored, understand the definition of a complaint and know how a complaint should be escalated.

All employees are required to sign a declaration to acknowledge their understanding and agreement to act within the requirements of our complaints policy.

If you appoint someone to act on your behalf

If you ask someone else to act on your behalf you should provide us with written authority to allow us to deal with them.

If you employ a professional to represent you, you will need to meet their costs yourself.

Appendix 1

Lloyd’s Coverholder’s Complaints Referral Procedures

1. Other than as set out in the sections below, Cobalt Underwriting Services Ltd (the Coverholder) does not have authority to handle complaints against Underwriters.

2. The Coverholder shall operate written procedures agreed with the Underwriters that allow complaints to be made by any reasonable means including by letter, by email, in person and over the phone. If a complaint is received which is not in writing it shall be promptly recorded in writing and the record of the complaint shall be included in the details and relevant documents to be provided to the Underwriters in accordance with section 3.

3. The Coverholder shall, in accordance with section 4, send to the Underwriters details of all complaints (whether or not from eligible complainants, as that term is defined in the FCA Handbook) received by the Coverholder and which are the responsibility of the Underwriters together with all other documents relevant to the complaint. Thereafter, the Coverholder shall continue to provide promptly to the Underwriters any further details or documents received relevant to the complaint.

4. The details and relevant documents referred to in section 3 shall be sent to the Underwriters at the address details below no later than two business days after the day that the complaint is received.

Manager, Market Services

Fidentia House
Walter Burke Way
Chatham Maritime
Chatham Kent
ME4 4RN
UK

Tel: +44 (0)1634 392320
Email: member-complaints@lloyds.com
Fax: (0)1634 392947

5. The Coverholder shall maintain a register of all complaints received (whether or not from eligible complainants) and shall provide a copy of the same to the Underwriters upon request.

6. The Coverholder shall send an acknowledgement to all eligible complainants (as that term is defined in the FCA Handbook) within two business days of receipt of the complaint. The acknowledgement shall be in a form agreed with the Underwriters and shall include a copy of “How We Will Handle Your Complaint”

7. Each week, the Coverholder shall in accordance with any Lloyd’s guidance complete the Lloyd’s Complaint Notification Template with details of any complaints received from eligible complainants but not previously notified to Lloyd’s and send the same to complaints-notification@lloyds.com

Contact Us

Cobalt Underwriting Services
1st Floor, 63 St Mary Axe
London EC3A 8AA

enquiry@cobaltuw.com

020 3642 0200 (Main)

Cobalt Underwriting Services

Cobalt Underwriting Services Limited (“CUSL”) is a company incorporated in England, Company Number 07979365, and authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN 605713) under Part IV permission to undertake a range of regulated activities.

CUSL operates as a fully Shariah-compliant Underwriting Agency (or Managing General Agent) based in the City of London focusing on the provision of Shariah-compliant insurance and reinsurance products and services.