Miss-sold...miss-lead ??

NeKo

It seems that half the UK population has been miss-sold. What does this really mean?

From most of what I have read on the forums people have either:

1. Not been given correct information about a product they have been asked to pay for.
2. Been told that it was necessary to purchase a product when it was NOT.
3. Been sold a product that they may already have.
4. Been made to pay for something extra without even knowing it (hidden extras).
5. Been sold a product that is not suitable for them.
6. Been sold a product that is not necessary.

"Miss-Sold". Is this the correct terminology for the above?

Does the above not fit the criteria of: Fraud, Conn, Deception, Theft, Robbery ?
Does the aforementioned not normally carry a jail sentence?
Does this "Miss-Sold" term mean the same as the above but worded to make it sound more polite?

If this is the case, we are all going to be MISS-LEAD (fobbed off, told lies, decieved, confused). by those people into thinking that we are NOT entitled to our money back and this is the main point for this post.

Most of these financial organisations are not very financially sound anyway and many have had to be bailed out by the Govenment with OUR money already. In the past years when they were ripping us all off (oops,,, miss-selling us products) they used their gains to award themselves nice bonuses.Will there be sufficient revenue available to cover the costs that have to be returned to miss-sold PPI claimants? I have my doubts and as the claims increase the reasons for not compensatring you will increase in proportion. Most have special teams to deal with this and they will be trained to fobb you off at the first instant I would guess. If this were not the case, they would not be taking the time limit of 8 weeks to settle claims. They would have predicted this and written the software to calculate all our refunds just like the software they use when you called them asking for a loan. Has anyone ever experienced an 8 week wait to recieve details and terms of a loan (including the PPI which they automatically include in most cases whether you meet the criteria or not)?

And on a closing note.... All I can say is.... Please don't let these people fobb you off when you ask for your money back. It is YOUR money which you are rightfully entitled to and please remember this at all times!

There are a few that are flying under the radar at the moment and it would be good to see more cases going to the courts.

Perhaps this needs a door to door campaign to release the full potential of claimants.

This must be a nightmare of a financial penalty for the elderly who may already struggle to pay their fuel and heating bills when the additional money could be better spent. While this may be a case for a family member to check their elderly parents finances, it may also be a good project for organisations like Help the Aged and similar.

NeKo

marshallka

I totally agree about the being misslead but FOS calls it misselling and you only get it back with some interest if you are lucky. If FOS finds in your favour AFTER being fobbed off and its a blatant fob off then they sometimes award the stress and inconvenience money of about £250 to £500. Still not enough in my eyes:rolleyes:.

The main thing is that the companies are fined large amounts by the FSA BUT they get away with it again as they pay up quickly and get a REDUCTION in their fines (unlike us lot who repay our loans early and we are penalised for doing so:rolleyes:) by using OUR money (and the interest gained on massive amounts of money they got from the consumer by way of "misselling PPI" anyway) to repay and then take a further few months for the redressing of the PPI.

Take the massive fine by Abbey, they settled it with the FSA early and got a large reduction BUT they are still holding back repaying everyones PPI for long periods of time so they are still gaining "interest" on the amounts that are due back to consumers. I just wish that I had massive amounts of money (illgotten some would say) to invest for a short period and then pay it back, this would mean I could perhaps live for a period of time off the interest gained on it. Just one big con....

dunstonh

It seems that half the UK population has been miss-sold. What does this really mean?

The stats certainly do not suggest that. Even in areas where they have been reviews due to misselling concerns, the actual number of mis-sales is typically very low. Usually single digit percentage wise. e.g. contracting out of pensions had a potential failure rate of just 1.5%.

There are some exceptions but often that is due to campaigns encouraging people to complain, even when they were not mis-sold, in the hope that the seller doesnt have the paperwork any more to back up the recommendation. Endowments were a good example of that where most payouts were not upheld as mis-sales but still resulted in payout due to lack of evidence as it was missing/destroyed/incomplete.

Claims companies are another problem. They encourage people to put in "fraudulent"/try-it-on complaints even where there is no complaint to answer. Their agenda is to get money up front or hope the selling firm no longer has paperwork.

A lot of the sales of products took place in times when people didnt complain and there wasnt seen to be the need to protect your backside as much as there is now. So, record keeping was not as in depth as it is now.

If FOS finds in your favour AFTER being fobbed off and its a blatant fob off then they sometimes award the stress and inconvenience money of about £250 to £500. Still not enough in my eyes:rolleyes:.

Or take the other view. In IFA down the road from me told me that he had a complaint from someone that he hadnt been in contact for years and felt he wasnt getting good service. The IFA was able to produce copies of emails going back and forth between him and the client during that period as well as a log showing home visits with their pension specialist and two portfolio reviews. The compliance firm for that IFA rejected the complaint but told the IFA to pay £250 as a goodwill gesture. He was fuming as he had done nothing wrong and it was basically encouraging people to complain to get paid some money. This person was apparently a serial whiner.

joncow75

I kind of have to agree with Dunstonh with some of their comments. I bet a portion of people putting in reclaims for PPI are doing so knowing fine well what they were signing up for. I have had reason to complain as I had a seperate income protection policy through the bank at the same time they put PPI on 2 loans I had with them. I had 2 other loans with PPI, but no longer had the income protection policy at this time, so have not tried to get this money back, and see no need to, as it was my protection during the loan periods, and hopefully would of covered me if anything had happened.

However it is pretty shocking how many people have been genuinely miss-sold a policy that didn't fit their needs or cover them when they needed to claim. This campaign has given the industry a good shake which can only be a good thing for the consumer, much like credit card and bank charges have come down due to a feeling of injustice from the general public.

PPI sellers should be trained correctly and regulated.

Claims companies encouraging people to try and get money back regardless are actually doing damaged to the campaign though, making all genuine consumers look like they are trying it on.