Equitable Life - Treasury "cannot find" 20% of policyholders

monkeyspanner

The treasurys Equitable Life compensation scheme administered by NS&I has failed to find 20% of Equitable policyholders eligible for compensation. If you had an Equitable life policy and have not heard anything you should contact the compensation scheme. The treasury has published the following statement.

"Policyholders who believe themselves to be eligible and have not heard from the Scheme by April 2013 should first confirm that their policy is eligible for the Scheme by telephoning the ‘Policychecker’ service.
"After this, they should write to the Scheme to state their eligibility for the Scheme, quoting their full name, address and their Equitable Life policy number."

• Eligibility Enquiries Policychecker Service: 0300 0200 150
• http://equitablelifepaymentscheme.independent.gov.uk/contactus.htm

As the compensation scheme is due to be wound up during 2014 and any surplus of scheme returned to the treasury you should act now.

The recent audit office report finds that, of the 1.46 million eligible policyholders, 407,000 have received payments totalling £577 million. It estimates that 664,187 customers are due to be paid by the deadline. As many as 292,000 people due compensation will not be paid because they cannot be located. Although just 35 per cent of payments have been made, the scheme has spent 72 per cent of its £57 million administration budget. With the cost of each payment averaging £32.68, there are enough resources left to pay only 335,000 more customers unless the Treasury extends the budget, it said.

robatwork

I wonder how hard they try after the first "not known at this address" comes back?

I wasn't contacted although they would have known my employer details which haven't changed since I took out the policy years ago. I have moved house several times since however. One letter or phone call to the employer would have found me.

The whole EL debacle has meant I will never trust any of those "ratings" companies. Standard & Poor for example rated EL higher than any other assurance company - gilt-edged, AAAAA, solid as granite. Turned out to be rubbish because of course no external ratings company really knows what's going on inside the board room. So when I hear that xx company or the entire UK has been downgraded to A+ I don't give a fig, it's meaningless.

Perhaps should have moved this to the vent board!

scotsbob

"The treasurys Equitable Life compensation scheme administered by NS&I has failed to find 20% of Equitable policyholders eligible for compensation"

They have access to the largest government database so how come they can't find anyone?

monkeyspanner

See this Telegraph article about the treasury destroying a CD with 350000 names and addresses of ELAS members because they were worried about data protection issues.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/pensions/10060466/Treasury-destroys-disc-containing-350000-Equitable-Life-victims-details.html

robatwork

So the treasury destroys a disk that means the money owed will end up at the .....treasury. Serendipitous fo shizzle

Meanwhile many pensioners went from Standard to Poor.