Ombudsman publishes table of complaints data for first time

MikeJones_2

I have a vested interest in an article published today as I am a voluntary adviser for The Pensions Advisory Service (and I know at least one other regular contributor to this forum is as well).

So, mediating disputes is something of a personal interest which is why I'm often interested in the many varied posts on the pensions forum.

Today, the Financial Ombudsman Service has published a list of customer complaints citing individual companies. Quoting from the Press Release:

Walter Merricks – who will be stepping down as chief ombudsman next month after ten years in the role – said:

The complaints data we are publishing for the first time today will help people to see how the financial businesses that are responsible for nine tenths of the ombudsman's workload deal with customer complaints. The data shows that some businesses are much better, and some much worse, at complaints handling.

We have already been providing comparative complaints data on a private basis to the larger financial businesses – but this has led to no improvement in the standard of complaints handling by the worse-performing businesses. I believe that putting this information into the open will now give those worse-performing businesses vital encouragement to improve – which should mean fewer of their customers having to bring unresolved complaints to the ombudsman.

See:
- Table of complaints data showing individual businesses (FOS)


I'd be interest in any feedback/views readers have, if any.

Mike Jones

I work in the field of Pension Education and Pension Guidance in the UK. I am a member of the Specialist Pensions Forum as well as being a Voluntary Adviser for The Pensions Advisory Service. I work with scheme members, employers, trustees, scheme administrators and advisers on most things to do with employer sponsored pension schemes. The views expressed by me in this thread are my personal opinions. You should seek professional advice from an appropriately experienced and qualified adviser. I am not an IFA.

sleepless_saver

Thanks for posting this. Fascinating stuff, especially the percentage of complaints resolved in favour of the customer. It's difficult to make a lot of sense of the table with the raw numbers of complaints without knowing what proportion they are of the total volume of business for each company/area of business.

I will be continuing to get my insurance from esure, not Black Horse!

dunstonh

Interesting to see that PPI (non mortgage) is dominating the complaints stats and that the PPI sellers are having such a high overturn rate by the FOS. If they keep that up, the FSA are going to fine them big time. there is no way a company that gets 90% of FOS complaints held against them is going to get away with that for too long.

On the pensions front, it was interesting to see St James Place have such a poor complaints position. Nearly double the average for upheld in favour of consumer. Again, that suggests they are rejecting cases more than they should.

Zurich surprised me as their sales network is known to be pressure sales. Although the stats could suggest that Zurich are more inclined to give and not let it go to the FOS. Wthout knowing the actual number of complaints overall, the figures can be made to appear better than they actually are if the company gives in.

A lot of the companies are closed for new business so it possibly suggests that legacy issues are still affecting the insurance companies. Probably the tail end of endowments as they become time barred and people complain to the FOS to see if they can get the time bar overruled. Or it could be that their back office systems are showing their age and servicing issues are the problem.

Hmm, the more you look at it, the more you realise that without any context, the figures published dont really help provide any useful data apart from perhaps those that are massively above average on the FOS overturn rate.

I will be continuing to get my insurance from esure, not Black Horse!

Black Horse only retailed PPI insurance on loans. So, you wouldnt be getting your insurance from them. Virtually every complaint they would have had would have been on PPI.

This highlights the problem with publishing data in this format. It doesnt help see where the problems are. Is it an advice problem, a servicing problem, a complaints problem. Is it in your product area of interest or not?

MikeJones_2

dunstonh wrote: »

Hmm, the more you look at it, the more you realise that without any context, the figures published dont really help provide any useful data apart from perhaps those that are massively above average on the FOS overturn rate.

That was my first impression too, but I support any move that makes organisations seek to improve their complaints handling processes and procedures. I've nearly finished off one dispute case that's been on my desk for over a year.

Mike

LilacPixie

Very very interesting. I actually have a complaint in with the ombudsman regarding Blackhorse so its encouraging to see that 95% of the time the FOS finds in favour of the customer. I do think that thisismostly down to Blackhorses' complaints proceedures which are quite frankly a joke.