UK Fuel Cards Limited – Our Experience

UK Fuel Cards Limited – Read the T&Cs very Carefully

This blog post is related, to UK Fuels Limited, Company Reg No: 5023496 and no other company with any similar name.

Last year a sales person from UK Fuel Cards Limited called me and told about their Diesel Price guarantee fuel card. It sounded great, a guaranteed diesel price each week around 5p a litre cheaper than the pump price.

For 12 months everything went OK.  Our employee filled the van and we received an invoice promptly which we paid by direct debit.  The price was never as good as the initial sales person said and in fact some weeks it was more expensive than the local supermarket, but on the whole it was 1 or 2p cheaper, and it meant we didn’t have to give our employee a large amount of cash when he needed to fill the van.

In April they sent us a bill for £54 for 5 cards.  I rang the account manager  to point out we only had 3 cards and secondly to say that I had been told the cards were free. He said they weren’t and would not waive the fees, I closed the account, cancelled the direct debit and requested a final account statement, which never came.

A couple of weeks their credit department rang saying we owed some monies for fuel.  I agreed and paid this promptly via the Faster payments system and thought the account was closed. But no, two weeks later I get an invoice for two bounced direct debits.  I rang and complained and said I would not be paying them.  At the end of last week they then sent a Legal notice and said they would take me to court for the £150.  Again I rang and they said I had agreed to the terms and conditions and it clearly stated there would be a fee for bounced direct debits.

I quickly rang the FSB Legal Help line.  Did you know business are not protected by the laws on unfair contract terms that protect consumers?  However the adviser did point out that because there was no fee mentioned in the T&Cs that it was “uncertain”, hence probably unenforceable and secondly at £75 the bounced direct debit fee was more like a penalty for closing the account rather than a true reflection of the cost to the company.  I wrote to them pointing this out and asking them to provide evidence that it did cost them £75 for a bounced direct debit.

They did not provide any evidence on how the £75 was calculated, just told me the dates of the bounced direct debits and the credit department now reintroduced the £54 for the cards.  I called and they said it was a retrospective fee for the previous year.   The term re card fees is even more vague than the direct debit clause, it says ” The Company may charge a fee to the Cardholder either annually or for issue of the card either on setting up the account or upon replacement or renewal of the card, depending on the particular circumstances.  The company may also charge for any card issued to the Cardholder that has not been used in any one month”.   I call it a Martini clause, because it appears they can charge you a card fee at “Anytime or any place” .  The credit department then said if I paid the £54 and one bounced fee that no further action would be taken.

I think their behaviour is unreasonable and I like to believe that the UK courts would agree that they have treated us unfairly, however I have no more time to waste and cannot deal with the stress, so I have paid the £129.   Based on this awful experience, my advice to you before taking a fuel card with UK Fuel Cards Limited is as follows :

1. Get the sales person to document their offers in writing and keep the emails or letters for future reference.  I am sure the salesperson said the first year was free as I know I wouldn’t agree to pay £54 for fuel cards, but I have no proof and I foolishly signed the T&CS without fully understanding them.
2. Have no more cards than you need, they are not FREE and at some stage you may get hit with a fee.
3. If you think you might have cash flow problems and your DD will bounce don’t open an account, any bounced DD for any reason might result in a fee!  Who knows what that fee might be as there is no information in the T&Cs I signed, or on their website as at today (30/5/2013) documenting this amount. 
4. Read the T&Cs very carefully and if there is anything you do not understand or is not specific get them to explain them in writing – I made a big mistake in not reading them and understanding them.
5. Check the Diesel price they are offering against the prices in your local area, the website http://www.petrolprices.com/ lets you put in your postcode and gives diesal and petrol prices in your local area.  You may be surprised that you are not saving money after all!

This blog post is related, to UK Fuels Limited, Company Reg No: 5023496 and no other company with any similar name.