Our terms and conditions of advice

Please read these Terms of Advice carefully before you use our recommendation service, as these will apply to (i) our services; and (ii) your relationship with certain third parties. We recommend that you print a copy of this for future reference. You may request a copy of these Terms of Advice to be sent to you by post. Where you have done so, we are still entitled to rely on these Terms of Advice in the course of providing our services to you through our website.

Other applicable terms

These Terms of Advice refer to the following additional terms, which also apply to your use of our website:

  • Our Privacy & Data Policy, which sets out the terms on which we process any personal data we collect from you, or that you provide to us. By using our website, you consent to such processing and you warrant that all data provided by you is accurate.
  • Our Website Terms of Use, which set out the terms on which you may access our website and other services.

Information about us

anorak.life is a site operated by Anorak Technologies Limited trading as Anorak (Anorak, we or us or our). We are a company registered in England and Wales (company number 10854345) and our registered address is 24 Old Queen Street, London, SW1H 9HP. You should write to us at Anorak Technologies, Abbey House, 282 Farnborough Road, Farnborough, GU14 7NA, or email us at info@anorak.life.

Anorak is a trading name of Anorak Technologies Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), reference number 843798. You can find further details on the FCA’s Financial Services Register.

Who are we owned by?

Anorak Technologies Limited is owned by a series of institutional international investors.

What do we do?

We are permitted to advise on and arrange (bring about) deals in non-investment and general insurance contracts.

We help you understand your requirements for life insurance products (such as term life, income protection & critical illness) with personalised advice by carefully and selectively using personal, financial, third-party and open source data. Based upon the information you give us, we may provide you with recommendations about specific policies and insurers that are tailored to your needs, or we may direct you to specific products which we feel might be better suited to your objectives and needs. We may also follow up any recommendations provided online with an email informing you of your protection needs, as well as a phone call to discuss your needs directly with an Anorak adviser.  This means we act as an insurance intermediary. We do not provide or underwrite any insurance ourselves.

Online and offline advice

Whether a recommendation is made to you online or on the phone with one of our advisers, it will be considered regulated advice, as defined by the FCA. That means it will be suitable for your needs as we understand them.

Any recommendation you receive from Anorak, whether online or on the phone, will be based on our understanding of the insurance market, your needs as they are today (if any), and how they may change with time. Importantly, we believe that any recommendation will be intrinsically shaped by the professional judgement of the adviser making the recommendation to you, whether that be online or over the phone. We define professional judgement as the quality and experience of the adviser, and here at Anorak it is based on extensive market research, actuarial science, product-testing and, of course, real-life experience of advising customers.

We believe that our protection advice is streamlined: at its simplest, that means we have made some professional judgements on your behalf. We have not listed out the professional judgments that we consider when advising you, whether online or on the phone, partly because not all of these will be relevant for you, but mostly because we do not believe that it will be that helpful (there are a lot and they may seem confusing out of context).

The nature of the dialogue we are able to have with you online is such that we have to make a larger number of these judgments on your behalf (albeit shaped by your circumstances, needs and, where relevant, risk appetite) than we might need to on the phone. We recognise that you may want more information on what these judgements are and why we believe that they are appropriate for you; we also accept that after having seen our advice online you may want to challenge some of them – which is, of course, fine. Please feel free to contact one of our advisers directly and we would be happy to discuss your needs further with you. Our number is 020 3514 6702.

Conflicts of interest

Where we do provide you with a recommendation, this will always be what we think best meets your requirements. We value our independence and do not promote any specific insurer.

We have a legal and regulatory obligation to take all appropriate steps to identify and to prevent or manage conflicts of interest from arising. In the event of any of our business interests or activities creating a potential conflict of interest we will ensure that we take all appropriate steps to manage the potential conflict by maintaining robust systems, controls and staff training. In the unlikely event that we are unable to prevent the potential conflict, we will fully disclose to you, the general nature and/or sources of conflicts of interest and the steps taken to mitigate those risks.

Further details of our conflict of interest policy are available upon request.

Is our advice independent?

We offer a personal recommendation on the basis of a fair and personal analysis of the market. We act for you, our customer, not the insurers. In doing so, we will undertake a fair and personal analysis of the market to provide you with a recommendation that meets your demands and needs. We will regularly review our arrangements to ensure that the insurers and the policies we offer are representative of the market.

We classify all clients as ‘consumers’ for non-investment insurance business, which means you are afforded all protections under the rules of the Financial Conduct Authority.

Should we need to classify you differently we will discuss this with you, however, you should be aware that you may lose a number of regulatory protections which will be outlined in a revised agreement.

Prior to providing you with any advice we will take time to understand your current needs, circumstances and attitude to risk (where applicable). Any advice provided will be confirmed to you in writing. Please note that all our communications and documents will be provided to you in English.

Information on how we make our money is set out in the section on Fees, charges and our remuneration.

Providing information to us

To provide you with our recommendation and any quotes for insurance, we will ask you a number of questions which cover the questions needed by the different underlying insurance providers and any other intermediaries they may use.

Please take care to answer all the questions honestly and to the best of your knowledge in order that we may provide you with a personal recommendation and to prevent any policy you do take out from being cancelled.

In providing information to us, you confirm that you have the permission of any other people whose details you propose to use in obtaining a quote. This is especially important when its comes to sensitive data like health information.

Insufficient information

In certain circumstances we may not be able to obtain adequate information from you or other sources to provide you with a personalised recommendation. If this is the case, we may decline to provide you with a recommendation and any quotes. Alternatively, we may elect to provide you with advice but it will not constitute a personal recommendation.

How we obtain quotes

We use a third-party provider called IRESS Portal Limited (IRESS) to obtain the initial quotes that we present to you through the website.

IRESS is registered in England and Wales with company number 02596452, and its registered office address is Honeybourne Place, Jessop Avenue, Cheltenham, GL50 3SH.

Occasionally and where relevant, our advisers may obtain additional quotes directly from specialist insurers not provided through the IRESS panel.

The validity of quotes

We do not control the price, length of offers or special conditions relating to insurance quotes that we provide to you. These are set by the insurer. We cannot guarantee that you will be able to purchase the insurance policy for the price quoted and we do not accept any liability for any loss resulting from any change to the price, availability or validity of a quote. If you obtain a quote through Anorak, you may see how long it is valid for or any special terms by following the provided links.

Our advice to you is based upon indicative quotes and any quote is subject to any additional information an insurer may require from you in relation to your health or lifestyle which may ultimately affect your premium. You will be given a price prior to purchasing any policy but please note that premiums may rise during the term of policy.

Fees, charges and our remuneration

You do not have to pay Anorak any fees to use our services. When you buy a policy through us, the insurer will pay us a commission for the services we have provided. Further information can be obtained on request.

Details of any other fees or charges that you may be obliged to pay (for example administration charges or cancellation fees) are determined by the insurer, not us, but will be clearly set out before you commit to buying any policy.

Complaints

We endeavour to provide a first-class service to our customers, but we acknowledge that there may be occasions where we fail to meet your expectations. If you feel dissatisfied with any aspect of our service, then in the first instance please contact customer service at complaints@anorak.life. We will immediately carry out an independent investigation of your complaint and will provide a written response.

If we are unable to resolve your complaint to your satisfaction and you are an eligible complainant as defined by the Financial Conduct Authority, you will have recourse to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Details of the Financial Ombudsman Service are:

The Financial Ombudsman Service
Exchange Tower
London E14 9SR

complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk

020 7964 1000 (switchboard)
+44 20 7964 1000 (for calls from outside the UK)
020 7964 1001 (main fax)

0800 023 4 567 – Calls to this number are now free on mobile phones and landlines
0300 123 9 123 – Calls to this number cost no more than calls to 01 and 02 numbers

Are we covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS)?

We are covered by the FSCS. You may be entitled to compensation from the scheme if we cannot meet our obligations to you. This depends on the type of business and the circumstances of the claim.

Claims in relation to certain failings in arranging life or income protection insurance are covered for 100% of the claim, without any upper limit.

In all other cases, a claim may be restricted to 90% of the value of the claim, without any upper limit.

Further information about compensation scheme arrangements is available from the FSCS at www.fscs.org.uk or by telephoning 0800 678 1100.

Anorak terms and conditions of advice updated: 21st September 2022