FSA announces temporary PPI complaints timescales due to backlog

The UK’s financial watchdog has today (Monday June 13) agreed to temporary arrangements for Barclays, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland to handle Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) complaints.

The arrangements extend the time periods the firms have to deal with their backlog of stayed PPI complaints and the high volume of new complaints on PPI.  These arrangements have been put in place to ensure that the firms are able to handle the PPI complaints properly, the Financial Services Authority (FSA) said.

Under FSA rules PPI complaints have to be responded to within eight weeks. The extension agrees a timeframe for the firms to deal with the claims that have been put on hold and also agrees additional time for the firms to deal with PPI complaints received since the end of their involvement in the judicial review.

PPI complaints still with the firm but put on hold during the judicial review will receive a decision by the end of August;  PPI complaints received after the conclusion of judicial review but on or before the 31 August will be responded to within 16 weeks; and PPI complaints received on or after 01 September and before 31 December 2011 will be responded to within 12 weeks.
 
Strict conditions have been imposed on the temporary time extensions and the firms with the temporary time extension will have to keep PPI complainants and their customers fully informed and provide the FSA with regular reports on compliance.
 
The FSA expects all PPI complaints handling to return to the requisite eight week standard by 01 January 2012 at the latest. This arrangement only applies to the three named firms. All other PPI complaints are unaffected.

‘We want to see all PPI claims for compensation dealt with swiftly and appropriately. However some firms are facing a huge backlog and now a surge of new complaints which has created a bottleneck. It is not in the interests of consumers to receive further poor handling of their complaints as a result. This temporary extension means that these firms can process these complaints properly and fairly,’ said Margaret Cole, the FSA's interim managing director of the Conduct Business Unit.

‘We will be monitoring their progress carefully to ensure the new deadlines are met, that complaints are dealt with as promptly as possible and the backlog is cleared as a matter of urgency,’ she added.

A number of firms decided to put some or all PPI complaints on hold when the British Bankers' Association launched a judicial review of the FSA's new PPI complaints handling measures. The FSA and the Financial Ombudsman Service won the case and the BBA decided not to appeal on 9 May 2011.

Barclays has announced that it will be compensating customers who were mis-sold PPI on a ‘no questions asked’ basis. The decision has been welcomed by consumers groups.

‘Banks have a lot to do to re-build their reputation after over a decade of mis-selling PPI and then mishandling complaints about it.  It's fantastic to see Barclays stepping up in this way, acknowledging their mistakes and refunding customers what they're owed, no questions asked,’ said Which? chief executive, Peter Vicary-Smith.

‘Hopefully this will have a domino effect and other banks will follow suit. The sooner the banking industry can consign the PPI mis-selling scandal to the history books, the better,’ he added.