PPI Complaints To Financial Ombudsman Halved In The Last Six Months, Says Missoldppiclaims.info

Previously the FOS declared the possibility of their funding to investigate claims running out due to the sheer volume of complaints being received. However, between 1 January and 31 June 2012 it received 46,700 complaints about PPI, a 53% drop compared to the last six months of 2011. In addition some 72% of complaints were upheld in favour of consumers compared to 47% during the first six months of 2012.

A number of reasons for the drop in the number of complaints have been proposed, from consumers giving their claims after spending many months, and in some cases years, being fobbed off, to banks consciously focusing on dealing with the claims faster than before after the banking industry dropped its legal challenge.

Natalie Ceeney, chief executive of the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), said: "The proportion of complaints against different businesses that we have upheld in favour of the consumer – ranging from 6% to 100% – clearly highlights the difference in PPI Claims handling across major businesses over this period. It also reflects the efforts made by some businesses to resolve quickly the hundreds of thousands of PPI complaints that had built up during the banks unsuccessful PPI legal challenge.

"We now hope to see all businesses who were involved in PPI mis-selling resolving their customers complaints fairly, properly and quickly."

A breakdown of the figures revealed that Barclays Bank had attracted the largest number of PPI complaints in the second half of 2011 of almost a third or 6,975, compared to the next highest MBNA Europe which received 5,377. Lloyd’s and HSBC also warranted a mention with 4,257 and 2,813 complaints received from consumers respectively.

A spokesperson for Missoldppiclaims.info, said: "This is good news on two fronts. First, the drop in complaints made by consumers has allowed the Financial Ombudsman Service some breathing space after previous concerns that they would run out of funding and have to curtail their excellent surface. Second, whereas banks were simply sitting on cases in the hope the legal challenge by the banking industry would absolve them of the responsibility of sorting out the mess, now they have accepted they need to clear the complaints backlog and are doing so."

As well as reporting the breakdown on the number of complaints per lender received, the FOS also reports on the number of complaints received about PPI insurance companies and brokers. Top of the list between July and December 2011 was Norton Insurance Services, which clocked up 280 cases under investigation with the FOS, while Aviva received 265.

"It’s encouraging to see that the FOS is reporting individual insurance brokers as well as banks and building societies," said the spokesperson. "A lot of people assume that the PPI cases the FOS deals with exclusively regard banks, but the presence of some fairly big name brokers shows that no-one escapes the consequences of mis-selling PPI."