PPI still tops the list of most complained about financial products
Consumers are still feeling the effects of one of banking's biggest scandals, with complaints about Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) still topping the list of woes heard by the Financial Ombudsman Service.
A report released today by the Ombudsman revealed that it is still receiving up to 4,000 PPI cases each week and that half of all the cases it has received since 2001, of which there have been over 3m, have been related to PPI.
The Financial Ombudsman Service revealed that it had been able to resolve one in five PPI cases within three months, but remarked that a 2014 Supreme Court decision – Plevin v Paragon Personal Finance – meant that some cases had progressed slower than it would have liked. Excluding PPI, the Ombudsman pointed out that it had managed to resolve two-thirds (66 per cent) of complaints within three months.
Read more: Top banks could face millions in new PPI claims
Payday loans are also another bugbear of consumers, with the number of cases brought to the Ombudsman increasing by 178 per cent in the course of a year to March.
The analysis also revealed that 1.6m people had got in touch with the Ombudsman last year, with one in five of the queries it received going on to become full-blown investigations.
"It's been another year of big numbers and big changes for everyone, " said Caroline Wayman, chief ombudsman. "But we mustn't lose sight of the lives and livelihoods behind every complaint we resolve.
"That's why preventing mistakes of the past from happening again will help restore trust and fairness in financial services."
Read more: Banks to reassess 2.5 million PPI claims
Last year, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) set 2018 as the deadline for people to get their claims in for mis-sold PPI – a scandal that has cost the banking industry over £25bn.