The new website is available at www.ci-fo.org. Particular attention should be paid to the Funding Section as the Annual Levy notices have been sent to all entities who are required to pay (All regulated entities other than Trust Companies). If for any reason you want to apply for zero rate this has to be done […]

The latest half-yearly complaints data relating to banks, insurers and other financial businesses revealed an overall increase of 8%, continuing the upward trend. A spike in complaints about packaged bank accounts and continuing PPI complaints, largely brought about by claims management companies, is considered to be behind the increasing FOS workload. To read the stats in […]

The FCA has published a policy statement on improving complaints handling. The policy statement contains the FCA’s response to the feedback it received on its consultation paper published in December 2014 as well as the new rules. The new rules include the following requirements: extension of the “next business day rule” to three business days; […]

The latest issue of the Financial Ombudsman Service newsletter considers among other things: the sale of travel insurance, in particular winter sports and the manner in which these products were sold to consumers; the Ombudsman news snapshot of the work undertaken by the FOS during the third quarter of the 2014/2015 financial year; and a […]

On 17 November 2014, the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) published a thematic review on the complaints handling processes of retail financial firms in order to identify and mitigate any obstacles preventing effective complaint handling in the future. The current paper deliberately seeks to cover new ground from previous thematic review work. The Financial Services team […]

Barclays, Fidelity and HSBC have been flagged by the Financial Conduct Authority as the most-complained about firms for investments in the first half of 2014. Barclays had 2,844 investment complaints reported against it in the first half, the FCA said, followed by Financial Administration Services Limited (responsible for Fidelity ISAs and FundsNetwork) and HSBC, both […]

The draft legislation to establish an ombudsman scheme in Jersey was approved by the States of Jersey on 1 April 2014. It is therefore expected that the Ombudsman will be operational in Jersey before the end of 2014. http://bit.ly/1ybUdLh the draft law proposes to allow the Ombudsman to consider complaints arising from 1 January 2010 […]

The latest edition of Ombudsman News focuses on disputes involving health and medical insurance, payment protection insurance and credit files and credit reference agencies. (Source: Ombudsman News Issue 117) http://bit.ly/1mWXozd