How long do you wait after complaining for shortfall

Ashes

Hi, I put my first complaint letter in to C&G Febuary this year and after a few letter's telling me It's all in hand I havent heard anything for a couple of month's! How long is the average wait???????????
Kind regards Ashes

dunstonh

18 months to 2 years if it ends up going through the ombudsman is not unheard of.

C&G themselves dont sell financial services products. If it was sold using the Lloyds TSB/Scottish Widows side, then they would pass into them. If it was sold before that link up and using one of the older processes, they would have to find out whom sold it. The older the policy, the deeper the digging, the longer it takes.

Ashes

Thanks dunstonh, C&G pestered me for years to take out an Endowment policy with them, when I did take one out it was with Norwich Union, but through C&G.
Kind regards Ashes

susan47

I had two endowment complaints. One was dealt with directly by the company that sold it within a few months - they admitted it had been oversold and gave me back all my premiums with interest. However, the other one was with Scottish Amicable (now Prudential) and it's been a nightmare. They said because it was sold by someone else on their behalf, we had to complain to them...so that was back in October of 2002 that we first wrote to them. They ignored our complaint so we went to the Financial Ombudsman Service. After much form-filling and receiving countless letters telling us to be patient, we finally got a decision in our favour - in May of 2005. The guy was given 28 days to give us compensation - calculated by him apparently, but using the Ombudsman's guidelines. Not that it mattered, since he still hasn't paid us a penny and is still ignoring us. So that's getting on for three years and we're still waiting...

EdInvestor

It's interesting to see the way parts of the industry set themselves up to avoid paying up.

You can see why the FSA is changing the "polarisation" rules - part of the reason is to to get rid of small cowboy IFA firms, who find it all too easy to evade the law on paying compensation.

Expect financial products to be sold though banks or large national brokers/IFAs in future, where the FSA can make sure they have the proper insurance and put them out of business if they don't comply.

If you're buying any financial products in future you might like to check in detail exactly who (which company) is selling you the product - so that you can make a judgment about whether or not it would pay up should you need to make a claim.

dunstonh

Expect financial products to be sold though banks or large national brokers/IFAs in future, where the FSA can make sure they have the proper insurance and put them out of business if they don't comply.

Thats just crazy as most mis-sales come from banks. In addition, when you look at the mis-sales from IFAs, which are a minority of claims, it is the larger "sales force" type IFAs that represent the majority.

The FSA enforce the requirement of PI cover with all firms unless there are sufficent funds in the company to get a waiver. No PI cover and the FSA stops you trading.

You have also totally ignored networks in your post. IFA firms attached to networks are probably amongst the safest to use out of all firms (of any type).

EdInvestor

You have also totally ignored networks in your post.

Actually that's who I meant by "large national broker/IFAs", sorry didn't get the terminology exactly right :rolleyes:

The ability of some IFAs to dump misselling liabilities into one company, bankrupt it and then continue trading under another similar name is what I was focussing on - this gives all IFAs a bad name and should be stamped out IMHO.

Not quite sure that past performance on the misselling front is any guide to the future....;)

dunstonh

Ok, a bit of clarification is needed here. A network is not a national broker or an IFA. A network is something an IFA firm can belong to and they take on the responsiblity for ensuring compliance standards and FSA rules are met. They also take on complaints handling. If the firm ceases to exist, the complaint still goes through the network, although it may end up with the FSCS if applicable. Networks are regulated by the FSA.

So a small firm with a network is potentially a lot safer than a large national IFA that is self regulated. Indeed, it is the large national firms that have been playing the phoenix game in recent years.

You can see why the FSA is changing the "polarisation" rules - part of the reason is to to get rid of small cowboy IFA firms, who find it all too easy to evade the law on paying compensation.

Actually, it is more likely to do the opposite. There is an increasing number of self employed/partnership/Limited companies starting up who are tied or multi-tied. Polarisation has nothing to do with compliance requirements as far as compensation is concerned. A tied company or multi-tie is statistically more likely to have complaints than a IFAs.

So, a "cowboy" IFA firm can become a "cowboy" tied firm or "cowboy" multi tie. So how that improves the situation I don't know.