Feed: Mis sold Info Blog - AggScore: 45.8

Combined Insurance Company of America fined 2.8 million by the FSA

Were you sold a sickness and accident policy by this company between April 2008 and October 2010? If so you need to keep reading.

Cica had 542,133 policyholders who could now claim compensation for their failings in the accident and sickness market or sometimes better known as ppi mis sold to you and I the general public.

The company has said it will carry out a review on their past business but I would treat this with a pinch of salt and would advise you not to wait but to get your claim started today before they become inundated with complaints.

Cica sold this product to a wide variety of people through self employed agents who mainly targeted people who were either self employed, manual workers and even small business owners but this is not an endless list so if you are one of the 542,313 policyholders then get ahead of the queue and start your claim today.

There is three ways in which you can deal with this if you are a policyholder and they are as follows

Do nothing and allow Cica to contact you if you have the confidence this will happen

Submit your complaint in writing to them explaining why you feel you have been missold or

Use the services of a claims management company to do it on your behalf although this will generally cost you nothing upfront there will be a success fee to pay if they are successful so check this out and don’t pay any more than15% for their service.

PPI mis sold has been a long standing issue in the missold market in the UK and by calling this new fine imposed by the FSA sickness and accident is just a disguise so don’t be fooled by it.

So why has the FSA imposed this rather large fine on Cica?

The FSA has said it has fined them for treating customers fairly failures which included failing to manage its sales process, not having adequate systems and controls in place and their recruitment procedure which was basically based on a numbers game instead of quality which possibly could have resulted in the client not getting the right advice.

Cica has not written any new business since October 2010 and have worked with the FSA on this matter which is good news for the general public.

One of the big failings in all of this is their agents were self employed and only paid commission on the number of policies sold which in my opinion left the general public vulnerable and at the mercy of a good salesman. This type of sales should be banned in the UK financial services market to stop a repeat in the future and hopefully then would be see less ppi mis sold scenarios appearing in the future.

Pension Transfers the Pitfalls

Have you ever considered or have done pension transfers in the past?

If you have answered yes then here are some pitfalls that you should be aware of before you transfer or what you should have considered before you carried out your last transfer.

Are you within 10 years of retirement?

If so do not consider a pension transfer as the chances of you making more money are greatly reduced especially if you are in a final salary pension or a personal pension as the charges will possibly out way any growth you get in the last ten years to retirement.

Do  you have a final salary Pension?

If you have a final salary pension then in my opinion you should not transfer this to any other form of pension whether it be a stakeholder pension, personal pension or any other type of pension as you are almost certain to lose out in the long term.

If you have transferred in the past from a final salary scheme then you need to seriously consider getting a company to look into this on your behalf to ensure it was in your best interests to do so and not the advisors who recommended the transfer to you. Use the services of a good claims management company who has dealt with this type of complaint before and who won’t charge you an arm and a leg for their services like 25% success fee. Shop about and find the right one it could make all the difference to you.

Do you have a stakeholder pension and been advised or have transferred it into a personal pension?

This is a common way in which pension transfers are carried out and although sometimes it can be to the individuals advantage on many occasions it is not.

So here are some pitfalls to watch out for if you are considering this type of transfer or what you should have been aware of if you have already transferred your pension.

Age as above applies to this type of transfer so do not do it if you are within ten years of retirement.

You must be aware that if you move into a personal pension your fund will be charged for doing so.

Any future transfers will also be charged which is not the case when transferring from stakeholder pension to stakeholder pension.

Fund choices can be obtained within a stakeholder pension so do not be fooled into thinking a personal pension has more fund choice as most individuals will never use them and this can just be an excuse by an advisor to encourage you to transfer your pension.

This is just some of the areas you should consider before you carry out any pension transfers and if any of the above has applied to you then consider getting your case checked by a good claims management company.

Investment Bonds the Nightmare

Are you one of the people in the UK that has had the experience of investment bonds nightmare whether it was just because you were not advised about the product correctly or were part of the Key data scandal or the Barclays scandal?  If so you need to read this short report to get help whatever the case may be.

Firstly for the people that were involved in the Key data fiasco then here is some of the options available to you.

If the advisor who sold the product is still trading then you can submit a formal complaint to them regarding the sale and not just on the fact key data went out of business but possibly on the advice you received which can cover things like your attitude to risk, previous investment experience and age. These are just some of the points that you could look at when submitting a complaint.

If the advisor is no longer trading then you can approach the Financial Services Compensation Scheme direct and submit your claim to them.

Whatever way you chose to make your complaint you can either do it by yourself our use a claims management company to do it on your behalf.

Next we will look at Barclays and it comes as no great surprise that they have been caught up in the investment bonds market with one of their subsidiaries selling bonds to the older generation to help pay for their long term care.

This is a scandal and everything should be done to redress these people or their families if they have sadly passed away and I would not place any reliance on Barclays stating they will contact every client that had this type of investment and offer them redress I would act now and start your claim today.

Either write to them direct and make them aware of your concerns and wish to have your investment looked into or use the services of a claims management company to do it on your behalf. Whichever you decide act today and don’t hold your breath waiting on them contacting you.

If you have had a loved one who had this type of investment and has passed away you can still get redress paid in to the estate so don’t let this put you off. Contact the person who was the executor of the will and get them to submit a complaint on behalf of the estate or get them to contact a claims management company who will assist you in the process.

These types of claims are slightly more complex and can be more distressing but don’t let this put you off and allow the banks to keep your loved ones money.

Whatever type of investment bonds you have I strongly suggest you get the sale checked by a professional to ensure it matches your needs.

With Profit Bonds and MVR

Thousands of people up and down the country have money invested in with profit bonds and thousands will complain about the selling of these products in the future due to the small print and something in it called an MVR or MVA.

So what is an MVR or MVA and how will it affect your investment?

MVR stands for Market Value Reduction and MVA stands for Market Value Adjustment but in reality both are the same and do the same thing to your investment.

When you were sold your investment you would have been advised it was a medium to long term investment between 5-10 years but in reality if you try and access your money before ten years has expired then the companies have the right to apply these types of penalties on you.

These penalties can be substantial and have been as high as 60% in some cases which is not just levied against any profit the bond has made but the entire investment so if you have any with profits investment do not surrender it until you have checked out if an MVR or MVA has been applied or you could be in for a shock when you receive your money.

What can you do about it if you have an MVA or MVR on your with profit bonds and there are several things you should consider.

Firstly if you do not need access to the investment then leave it where it is and let it mature after 10 years as many companies will not apply these types of penalties at maturity but check with your provider to ensure this is the case.

Next you need to ask yourself were you ever advised about these types of penalties when you initially invested your money and the affect they could have on your investment. If the answer is no you were never advised then you have a case for being missold your investment.

If you feel this applies to you then you have two options available to you which are

Submit a complaint to the company or advisor who sold you the investment in the first place, do this in writing and set out why you feel you have been missold the product or

Use a claims management company to submit the complaint on your behalf as generally they have the experience to handle such cases and most will operate on a no win no fee basis.

Whatever you decide remember these two things

You can submit your complaint direct without the help of a claims management company and you should act as soon as you become aware do not put it off for another day as this will only delay matters and the MVR could be increased in the future.

Take care of your money and if you have any with profit bonds then get them checked today.

Banks try to standstill PPI claims

As you will be mindful endure week Lloyds and Barclays financial institution explained they may halt ppi claims right up until the judicial review was completed but one of the key banks in Santander have lead like in dealing with mis sold ppi circumstances.

Barclays have explained they will continue to deal with ppi mis sold claims as long as they do not happen below the judicial review but Lloyds have put a live on all circumstances.

Santander have brazenly explained they will continue to deal with the mis selling of ppi circumstances and are now attempting to finish circumstances as speedily as doable which the relaxation of the banks must stick to and redress all potential consumers who have been mis sold ppi by their branches.

If you have a claim against Barclays or Lloyds afterwards you must still post the claim to them immediately after doable afterwards give them the time in the pointers in which they have to review the claim afterwards post it directly to the Financial Ombudsman after the time period of time for a reaction has elapsed.

These banks are praying that people will not post their mis sold ppi circumstances to the Financial Ombudsman and if they do so they are afterwards praying that the Financial Ombudsman will not make a ruling on the claim because of the backlog they have before the judicial review has confiscated place.

In our view the Financial Ombudsman who is there to help the client must start off placing in higher resources to dealing with mis sold ppi claims so people can get redress if the claim is discovered in the consumers favour.

Doing this can additionally not launch Lloyds or Barclays from avoiding the problem and the Financial Ombudsman must start off to velocity the process till show these banks that the client is king and not the banks.

If you have a mis sold ppi claim afterwards use a claims mgmt company as they are mindful of all the rules and regulations surrounding mis sold ppi circumstances and can with a lot of luck help you get a favourable outcome in the shortest period of time of time. They can additionally develop up a claim for you to post to the Financial Ombudsman if need be to ensure you have the supreme luck of success using the claim.

We may wish other banks can happen out and talk with their potential consumers on their stance on mis sold ppi circumstances so potential consumers can decide which course to take, but we may constantly suggest you to post the ppi claims in all circumstances.

Floodgates for PPI claims

Well by now we will all be aware that the banks challenge on ppi claims that was taken to the high court in October 2010 and had its hearing on 24^th Jan 2011 has finally come to an end with the Banks and financial institutions failing to lodge an appeal within the 21 days granted by the court so the flood gates on missold ppi cases can begin.

What this means for the consumer is great news as the banks and financial institutions need to start to look into your complaints and pay out compensation where they feel necessary to do so as a result of being mis sold ppi. One word of warning at this point is that if any bank or financial institutions think they have a remote chance of success then they will not pay out your claim. So how do we as the public and claims management firms overcome this hurdle and the answer is quite simple, do not give up on their first answer if you feel you have a genuine case.

Every case that the Banks and financial institutions reject they run the risk of having the missold ppi case being submitted to the financial ombudsman for the final decision but they are willing to run the risk as they are confident that more people will drop the case than pursue it any further and this is why it is important to employ the services of a claims management company to help you with your ppi complaint.

For every case that is submitted correctly to the Financial Ombudsman costs the company you are claiming against even more money as they have to pay a fee for every case submitted to the financial ombudsman and the more people that are aware of this as well as claims management companies then the Banks and financial institutions will think twice before rejecting your initial ppi claims.

So what should you do to maximise your success in reclaiming ppi that you should never had in the first place and the answer is quite simple, pay a claims management company to do it for you but make sure you do not pay more than 15% as a success fee otherwise it will not be worth it. Search the internet for companies that do not charge any more than this and a helpful tip for doing so is type in missold to Google or missold mortgages or missold pension and you are sure to find a good claims management company that will not charge you more than 15% for submitting your ppi claims and maximising your chances of success very quickly. Good luck whatever way you decide to claim.

Barclays Bank Complaint records including PPI claims

Barclays Bank one of a handful of Banks that did not require a bail out during the recession  should be considered one of the best Banks based on this but does this give you a true insight into the bank when they are dealing with consumer complaints and especially in relation to ppi claims.

Recently they joined Lloyds Bank in advertising that clients can claim direct for being missold ppi which has always been the case so why would they get involved in a joint advertising campaign with another Bank that has one of the worst records in the UK when dealing with consumer complaints during the period from the 1^st July 2010 to the 31^st December 2010.

Because we are unsure as to their motive of the joint advertising campaign we have decided to have a look at their complaints during the same period to see if we can uncover a reason for this.

Well it may come as no surprise that Barclays Bank Plc had 6535 complaints in this period which apart from Lloyds Group placed them in fourth position for having the highest number of complaints recorded against them, the only other Banks or financial institutions that had worse records apart from Lloyds was Santander and HSBC, so does this tell the consumer something about both Banks and why they have joined forces in an advertising campaign for clients to submit ppi claims direct without the help or guidance of a claims management company.

So let’s look a bit further in to the Financial Ombudsman figures and look at the industry average for complaints that were upheld in favour of the client in all the financial services fields which was a staggering 53% which shows that consumers should be using the services of claims management companies when making complaints in the financial services field and then let’s take a look at Barclays Bank who had the 4^th biggest number of financial complaints in the industry and they still were higher than the industry average by having a huge 56% of their complaints submitted to the Financial Ombudsman being upheld in favour of the consumer.

So after reading these stats is this a company that you feel that would review your complaint fairly, in my opinion I would not trust them but then the decision is yours. One thing to bear in mind if you decide to submit your ppi claims direct is do you honestly feel that they will treat your complaint any different from the figures stated above or was the advertising campaign a way in which both Barclays and Lloyds could reduce the amount of compensation they are expecting to pay out as this is in the region of 4.5 billion between them.

PPI claims and Lloyds Bank the real figures

Lloyds bank have started a national advertising campaign to get clients to submit their ppi claims direct to them but let’s look at some real facts about Lloyds and their complaint handling and then you can decide whether to trust them or not when dealing with your missold claim.

Black Horse which is part of the Lloyds Banking group had 2138 complaints received in the period between the 1^st July 2010 and the 31^st December 2010 for all types of financial services products of which a staggering 86% of complaints submitted to the Financial Ombudsman Service were upheld in favour of the client. The average for all businesses was 53% so why is Black Horse so high? Does this give you confidence that the Lloyds group will deal with your ppi claims fairly? It certainly would not give me confidence that I would be treated fairly.

So is this a one off or is this repeated throughout the Lloyds banking group? Well let’s have a look at one of their other businesses within the group and see what their figures are, we will look at Lloyds TSB Bank Plc and see what their figures is for the same period and you can then make your own mind up whether you think they are treating customers fairly or not and whether by submitting your missold ppi case by yourself will be worth it or not.

In this period Lloyds TSB Bank Plc had a staggering 12234 new complaints relating to the financial services market far greater than any other bank or financial institution and they want you to trust them with their statement on mis sold ppi cases, why would you based on these figures and what makes it even worse is that 74% of these cases that was submitted to the Financial Ombudsman were held in favour of the client. This looks like a company you can trust to be treating their customers fairly based on these figures? Absolutely not.

Is this the reason they have done a complete reversal on missold ppi as they were one of the first to stop paying out on these types of claims and fully supported the court action to have the FSA decision overturned, then realised that they were not going to win so are coming out as the bank that cares.

Don’t get caught up in their advertisements regarding ppi as these figures are testament that they do not treat customers fairly and therefore you should use a claims management companies if you have a complaint against Lloyds Bank.

Don’t risk 15% of your compensation by trying to deal with them by yourself as these figures prove they do not act in the best interests of their clients when dealing with ppi claims.

Make ppi claims against Barclays Bank

Barclays Bank along with Lloyds Bank launched a national advertising campaign in the national press to encourage clients to make their ppi claims direct to them without getting claims management companies involved. We need to consider why they have taken this stance and what they are afraid of by doing so.

We will cover some areas that you should consider if you are going to make your missold ppi claim directly with both Lloyds and Barclays and what your potential savings could be. Most claims management companies will operate on a no win no fee basis if you use them for your ppi claim and you could pay as little 15% success fee so what is wrong with this as both banks will charge you for overdraft fees, generally around 15% for credit card interest and on average 12% plus interest on any loan you take out with them so why are they not wanting you to use a claims management company.

There is nothing wrong with you submitting your claim direct but remember you only get one chance to submit a successful case, is this the reason the banks want you to submit it yourself so you can make errors in you submission so they have a get out clause or is there something else. Well in my opinion they want to close claims management companies down because they know there are other storms on the horizon such as mortgage claims, pension claims and investment claims and are going to try and reduce the amount of claims management companies that are going to be available to deal with these cases.

If you decide to make your ppi claims direct then consider the following, when you submit your missold ppi claim also make a cheque for £10 made payable to the bank for a data subject access request whether your ppi is on a credit card or loan as this will reveal so much more information that you could possibly use to gain further compensation against Lloyds and Barclays Banks.

By obtaining your file on a credit card for example you will be sent your file including agreement and all your statements which can be very useful and possibly cost the Banks even more money. When you receive them go through all your statements and check for any charges on the statements for late payment’s etc which were charged at £25 then record the dates of each £25 charge and total them all up then write to the bank or credit card company concerned and ask for a refund of these charges which they are duty bound to repay you.

This in my opinion is one of the reasons that Lloyds and Barclay’s Bank don’t want you to use a claims management company when submitting your ppi claims.

How mis sold ppi claims work

Mis sold PPI has affected millions of people in the UK and over the next 5 years it is estimated that over 5 billion pounds will be paid out to clients in the UK who have been missold. So what are the alternatives you have and what will you need to make a successful claim.

Firstly let’s put one myth to bed if you had PPI over 6 years ago you can still claim on the policy as long as you can provide certain details on the case. With this myth out of the road let’s start to look at other areas in the ppi claims process.

There are two ways in which you can make a PPI claim on credit cards so let’s see what is involved in each so you can decide which way you want your claim to go and what are the advantages and disadvantages of both.

Claim one is the fastest and simplest way to make your mis sold ppi claim which is simply write to the company expressing your concerns or get a claims management company to do it on your behalf. You have to be specific when making your complaint why you are making your complaint and this is sometimes why it is better to use the services of a claims management company that will not charge you more than 15% for their services.

Claim type two is for people that are reclaiming ppi on their credit card and you should be aware of this before commencing this type of claim. You can either follow the steps above or if you think you may have incurred charges on your credit card you can deal with them at the same time. This may take a bit longer but you do have the opportunity of getting back unfair charges that have been applied to your credit card in the past. If you are going to do this yourself you need to enclose a cheque for £10 made payable to the credit card company for a Data Subject Access Request along with your ppi missold claim.

The disadvantage to this is your claim may take slightly longer than normal as the company has 40 days to return your file to you but the wait may well be worth it in the long run.

You can do this type of claim by yourself or with the help of claims Management Companies and we would always suggest the latter to maximize your chances of success.

Typical charges for dealing with missold ppi and credit card charges should not exceed 15% of the total compensation you receive and if you are looking at a website that is charging more then I suggest you search online until you find one at 15% as this can make a substantial difference to the amount of compensation you receive. Good Luck.