Single Mum Slays a Dragon

Last weekend I ruined a man’s breakfast.

True dinks.

It all began when I answered a question from Louise in last week’s newspaper.

Here’s a recap:

Louise read my book, went on a Date Night (by herself!), and dutifully checked her bank statement. She found that she was being whacked $90 a month for credit card insurance.

She’d been told -- when she applied for a credit card -- that the only way the bank would give a single mum a card was if she got credit card insurance.

That was a lie.

For the uninitiated, credit card insurance is what Vanilla Ice is to hip hop: a total marketing conjob concocted to fleece unsuspecting people of their money. And that’s not just my view either -- the Royal Commission labelled credit card insurance ‘junk’ and called for it to be banned.

So, for the next month Louise tried to put her policy on ice, ice baby. Yet that was easier said than done -- her bank, St George, bounced her from one department to another, and all the while kept billing her.

Just before the school holidays the bank agreed to stop the payments.

A win!

And Louise could do with a win.

She’s a single mum.

She’d just been laid off from her full-time job.

And her little girl has a very serious illness.

But you know where this is going, don’t you?

Yes, during the school holidays, when money’s always tight, St George hit her account and swallowed up the little money she had. That left her account overdrawn (then again, on the upside, more fees for St George!).

So in my reply last week I went straight to the top: I googled “who the hell is the CEO of St George Bank?” and up popped the smiling face of Ross Miller, the General Manager. I gently suggested (to a few million readers) that he pull his finger out and do something.

I can only imagine poor old Roscoe choking on his morning cornflakes as he read the paper and saw his name in print!

In any event, he got straight on to it. And I mean straight on it -- on a Sunday no less, when banks are all closed, and counting their billions.

The result? Louise not only got her junk insurance cancelled, she got a full backdated refund, paid into her account first thing Monday morning.

Alright, stop, collaborate and listen.

After Grandmaster Hayne recommended that government and regulators act to stop the selling of junk insurance, consumers could be up for up to $1 billion in refunds. So if you’ve been sold junk add-on insurance, head over to demandarefund.com and get your money back.

Rock on, Roscoe!

Tread Your Own Path!