Ombudsman: What is a final response?

slopemaster

What is a final response?

Sounds daft not to know, but what counts as a final response in order to go to the ombudsman?
Does an offer ‘in full and final settlement’ mean the same thing as a final response?
Or does it have to explicitly say it is their final response? (It doesn’t.)
It does tell me I have the right to go to the ombudsman; that seems to indicate it is a final response?

firsttimestudent

I think it is a very good question.

The few banks that I dealt with, I know they usually have a first-tier complaint team & a 2nd-tier complaint team. For example, with Santander, you make a complaint with the branch/telephone banking department (first-tier), and they will usually offer you a solution/refuse. You then bring this with the Central Complaints Team (2nd-tier) (or Customer Relations with Natwest) - and I usually regard their response as the "Final Response".

Having said that, I noticed more and more nowadays that the quality of replies by the "Central Complaints Team" (be it Santander or A&L before the merger) had been going downhill. Their responses are typical of someone who never really read/understood your complaint. I usually still have to call them back and tell them their illogical things, offer them one last chance to 'change their mind', telling them it is only going to get expensive for them if I bring this matter up with the FOS, and that is when they usually cave in (maybe they realise I'm not someone who is going to budge easily).

So, in summary, if your letter:

a) either offers a solution or denies that there was a problem (not merely an 'acknowledgement/receipt' of your complaint)
b) offers no suggestion for a follow up with a higher in-house authority

I would say you are within your rights to bring it to the Ombudsman!

slopemaster

Thanks for that.

From what you say I think I can probably go to the ombudsman now, but I might phone them Monday to check. Am anyway thinking of writing Santander one more letter before passing it to the ombudsman, giving them a week or so to respond. As you said.

I don't know, either someone at Santander complaints has a finely ironic sense of humour - or they're just idiots! Their offer ‘in full and final settlement’ was to put 50 quid into the account which is STILL BLOCKED.
We still have no access to the £3500 of our own money which is in this account. Increasing that by £50 does nothing to solve that problem.

10_66

slopemaster wrote: »

...I don't know, either someone at Santander complaints has a finely ironic sense of humour - or they're just idiots!...

I think you'll find they're just idiots.

As you've had your resolution letter from them, I would go ahead with your complaint to the Ombudsman anyway to get the ball rolling, on the basis that when you write back to Santander, their decision may stand. You can always cancel the complaint to the Ombudsman.

Newly_retired

If your complaint has been running for 8 weeks and you are not satisfied you needn't wait for any final deadlock letter. You can go to the Ombudsman.

slopemaster

10_66 wrote: »

I think you'll find they're just idiots.

probably.

I wonder does anyone know what difference it makes if you say
'I do not accept your offer in full and final settlement'
(ie I reserve the right to take them to court if it comes to that)
but they pay the money into the account anyway?
I mean, I'm not going to send them a cheque from my account with another bank that actually works, whilst they're holding my money.
Should I just write and say, I do not accept this money, take it out again.?

slopemaster

Newly_retired wrote: »

If your complaint has been running for 8 weeks and you are not satisfied you needn't wait for any final deadlock letter. You can go to the Ombudsman.

Thanks, but it's not that long yet, that's why I wondered.
In fact I think it was because my complaint was passed to them via the ombudsman that I had a response fairly quickly - tho the response didn't deal with ther problem.

(I think not many people know this; certainly I didn't. Although the ombudsman wont actually look at your complaint until the bank has had the opportunity to deal with it, they will pass your initial complaint on to the bank - and of course doing it this way signals to the bank that you are informed about your rights and likely to use them.)

firsttimestudent

SlopeMaster, you mentioned that your account has been blocked. Had you dealt with the Security/Fraud Department (or was their inefficiency the reason why you launched the complaint?)

If it's me I would call their Complaints Department, give them the reference number for this complaint, take down the name of the person who is talking to you, tell them how you had asked them to remove the block and how they had failed to act on that (despite having confirmed your identity) - and insist that they talk to their department while putting you on hold (i.e. I usually do not accept their 'promise' to call me back).

I completely agree with writing to the Ombudsman - just that it really takes ages for them to intervene (about 6 months?) and I don't think you will be happy to have your account in a deadlock for this amount of time!

All the best!

dunstonh

In fact I think it was because my complaint was passed to them via the ombudsman that I had a response fairly quickly - tho the response didn't deal with ther problem.

It makes no difference. In fact it makes things slower as you have to wait for the FOS to post the complaint on to the complaints dept of the firm.

and of course doing it this way signals to the bank that you are informed about your rights and likely to use them.

Makes no difference.

slopemaster

dunstonh wrote: »

Makes no difference.

I think it does make some difference, and I'll explain why.
(I didn't go into this before 'cos it complicated the issue)

Because I wanted to give more detail, and because I didn't know how long the Ombudsman would take, I sent a letter directly as well.
Santander didn't match up the two and realise they were the same complaint from the same person, so I actually had 2 responses.

The response to the letter direct from me was just a fobbing off letter, and it was from the first-tier complaints people. It said, basically, tough, but you can escalate this to central complaints. This was even tho I had written to the central complaints address.

The response to the complaint via the Ombudsman arrived the following day. (It had definitely been written in ignorance of the other letter as some of the detail was contradictory.) It didn't resolve the substance of the problem either, but it apologised and said we're sending you 50 quid in 'full and final settlement', but you can escalate it to the ombudsman.

So it seems I accidentally did a controlled experiment!
And sending via the ombudsman seems to skip you straight to the second tier of the process, so actually saves time.

slopemaster

firsttimestudent wrote: »

SlopeMaster, you mentioned that your account has been blocked. Had you dealt with the Security/Fraud Department (or was their inefficiency the reason why you launched the complaint?)
If it's me I would call their Complaints Department, give them the reference number for this complaint.....

Thanks, but unfortunately the dept that has blocked the account do not speak to customers, and will not even tell other bits of their own bank what the exact problem is. We have been told contradictory things about what ID has to be provided - including some stuff we simply do not have. Thus I think better done in writing. I did do exactly what you suggest when I was initially unable to sort the problem out in a branch - but the Complaints Department was incredibly unhelpful and basically said "see you in court" when I asked for help to resolve the problem!

firsttimestudent wrote: »

I completely agree with writing to the Ombudsman - just that it really takes ages for them to intervene (about 6 months?) and I don't think you will be happy to have your account in a deadlock for this amount of time!!

I am sorry to hear that, and no I will not be happy.
But I am fortunate to have another current account and to be in a position where I can manage without this money for a while. (Otherwise i would be standing outside the branch with a placard!)
I've had to make other arrangements anyway to rearrange the direct debits. That was a big hassle, but its done now. So that money they have blocked will just sit there I guess. Until either the Ombudsman or a court orders them to give it back.

When I do finally get it back there'll have to be an argument about interest too I guess, if it does drag on. As this account pays 5% on £2500 and nothing after that. Well I had £2500 in there, but then I sent a payment of £1000 which was supposed to go in, and back out again. But then they blocked the account so it was stuck in there and I'll be getting no interest on it