Posts Tagged ‘payout’
RBS and Lloyds won’t play nice over PPI payouts
June 14th, 2011 • 14 Comments
The Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group clearly think that Barclays are a big pile of jessies as they won’t be following their lead on the offer of automatic payment protection insurance payouts.
Barclays announced yesterday that they’re going to pay out some of its customers’ PPI complaints, ‘no questions asked’, after they got stung by the High Court for misselling of PPIs. RBS and Lloyds obviously believe this is wimp-talk.
In fact, they’re going to ask lots and lots of questions, preferring to look at claims on a case-by-case basis.
Kath Allen, spokesperson for RBS, says: “We are taking active steps to process all complaints within the Financial Service Authority’s (FSA) timeframes. We remain focussed on making sure our customers get a fair outcome within those timeframes.” So if you made a claim before 20th April, you should have a decision by 31st August. Anything after that, you should have a response within 16 weeks.
Charlotte Sjoberg, spokesperson for Lloyds Banking Group, says: “We are handling all PPI complaints fairly and consistently regardless of when they were received. We will ensure that we provide a clear response to every customer that has submitted a complaint to us before 6 May by the end of August.
“For customers who have submitted a complaint on or after 6 May, will we provide a full response within 16 weeks of receiving the complaint.”
There you have it. No gestures of goodwill from this particular shower of shits.
Barclays settle PPI claims, no questions asked
June 13th, 2011 • 1 Comment
Remember us telling you about Barclays getting in a bit of bother over the misselling of PPIs? Well, they’re going to refund them, ‘no questions asked’ (provided you complained before 20 April).
These payments are a “gesture of goodwill” from the bank and will be made up of all premiums paid plus interest.
With tens of thousands believed to be in line for big payouts, Barclays could be looking at forking out around £1bn.
If you’re one of those that complained, you’ll have to wait around 16 weeks before this all gets resolved. A pain in the rear perhaps, but at least you’ll be getting your money back.
In a statement about its decision to compensate existing claimants, Barclays said: “We have said before that when we get things wrong, we apologise and work hard and work fast to put them right as quickly as possible.
“Working in close co-operation with the FSA and the Financial Ombudsman Service, and in recognition of the delay customers have experienced whilst awaiting the outcome of the high court judgement, we can confirm that we are contacting customers whose complaint was put on hold on or before 20 April with an offer to settle their complaint in full as a gesture of goodwill.”
If you think you might have been mis-sold a PPI policy, then you need to complain directly to your bank. If you don’t know how, the Guardian have a nice template letter you can use.
Barclays has become the latest bank to gear up towards shelling out a humungous amount of dough to customers as compensation for the mis-selling of Payment Protection Insurance (PPI).
The bank has ringfenced £1 billion as potential compensation and has said that it won’t be appealing against a court ruling decreeing that banks must redress customer complaints about PPI. Last week, Lloyds set aside £3.2 billion for the same reason.
You might have been mis-sold PPI if you have it but didn’t realise you were buying it, if you were told you had to buy it (you didn’t), or if you were sold it and it doesn’t even cover you (if you’re self-employed for example).
The British Bankers’ Association has also said that it won’t be appealing against the court ruling, meaning that more banks will be setting aside more money and compensating customers in what is quickly becoming the biggest banking scandal in recent memory.
UK banks face £4.5billion bill after judicial review
April 20th, 2011 • 5 Comments
The swines that run the UK’s banks won’t be happy this morning after they collectively lost a judicial review which could see them hit with a £4.5 billion fine after claims that they mis-sold loan insurance.
Banks are now going to have to look back on past sales of Payment Protection Insurance (PPI), taking into consideration every policy, including those taken out by people who haven’t complained.
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) are said to be “disappointed” by the ruling and has 21 days to appeal. There’ll be a lot of teeth gnashing and clenching of fists going on, that’s for sure.
Already, thousands have already received compensation on PPI policies, which were supposed to repay one’s loans if income dropped thanks to illness or loss of employment. The banks challenged the Financial Services Authority (FSA) over guidelines published last year which said that banks needed to contact all past PPI customers and ask them to complain if they were under the impression that they’d been mis-sold of policy. However, High Court judge, Mr Justice Ouseley, rejected the challenge.
Natalie Ceeney, the chief financial ombudsman, said: “This judgment is very clear-cut – and it confirms that the ombudsman’s approach to PPI complaints is right. People have been waiting a long time while the banks’ legal action has been ongoing. I would now like to see financial businesses showing real commitment to sorting out their customers’ complaints efficiently and promptly.”
Of course, there have been many PPI sales sold which were appropriate, however, largely, it has been suggested that our beloved banks have been mis-selling them and raking in millions of pounds from selling insurance that people just didn’t need, couldn’t claim on or, indeed, weren’t even aware they had.
If the banks appeal is unsuccessful, customers will be repaid their PPI premiums plus interest. Thus far, there’s been more than 200,000 cases referred to the ombudsman with around three in four complaints being upheld.
Halifax mortgage customers can expect unexpected pay-outs
February 21st, 2011 • 8 Comments
If you’re a Halifax mortgage customer, you could be in for a small windfall in the near future – that’s because the bank are making a ‘goodwill’ payment to 300,000 of you. It’s because Halifax is “committed to running its business with the highest levels of integrity and treating its customers fairly” – oh, and because it agreed a deal with the Financial Services Authority.
The announcement of the payments comes after it was discovered that Halifax had been, let’s say ‘vague’ over its right to charge customers more for standard variable rate mortgages and will total about £500 million altogether.
The Halifax raised the ceiling on its standard variable rate from bank rate plus 2% to bank rate plus 3% in January 2009, citing “extenuating economic conditions” but adding on extra charges to customers who hadn’t been pre-warned that this could be the case when they first took out their mortgages.
Affected customers will receive appropriate credits into their mortgage accounts in April. Meanwhile, a Halifax spokesperson is quoted as having said: “”We have had very few complaints – in the tens, fewer then 50.” So that’s alright then. They almost got away with it.
[BBC]
Massive payout for ‘toxic sofa’ victims
April 26th, 2010 • 1 Comment
It’s a great day for those of you with chemical burns all over your poor bodies as a result of chemical burns from your innocent-looking sofas. There’s some compensation coming your way!
The Home Retail Group (parent of Argos) and Walmsleys are among companies who have been ordered by a stern-wigged judge to pay as much as £20 million to 2,000 people who were burned by anti-fungal agents in the Chinese-made sofas. Further compensation could be on its way as another 2,500 cases will be heard next month.
As many as 100,000 ‘toxic sofas’ had sachets of “highly sensitising” fungicidal chemical dimethyl fumarate (DMF) inside them, in an attempt to stop them from going mouldy while in storage. But the sachets turned into a gas that burned through clothes and on to skin. Horrific stuff when all you want to do is sit down, relax and watch Come Dine With Me.
DMF has now been banned in the EU, although the companies that have been fined are expected to appeal.
