Just a quick question for ims21, or anyone: for the settlement of the PPI, I need to sign a confidentiality clause saying "I confirm that the details of this settlement, including any specific amounts or documentation are and will remain confidential to Loans.co.uk and [myself] and that such details and documentation will not be published or disclosed to any third party". But I assume they'll have to check with the lender (GE) & insurer too? ! Shall I just sign it? I'll post it by 1st class RD today I expect what they mean is that I shouldn't post the precise amount, for example, on sites such as these! Think I may have stated the approx amount already on CAG. PCB

Thanks ims. And if they don't cough up well before 5th April 2013, I'll be on to the FOS - and will be claiming further interest!!

So, in the absence of any advice to the contrary, I'll post my acceptance of their final offer today. I can declare the 8% to HMRC once received, especially as we're nowhere near the end of the tax year yet. Thanks, PCB

ims21, I don't have the financial data in front of me now, but I do happen to remember that £9136.31 (in their letter) is the exact amount of the single insurance premium in their loan schedule so assuming they have calculated the interest correctly, this is the correct amount due to me. As you say this is still a result. I'm glad that my thread has been of assistance to anney63 too By the way, although I don't normally answer my house phone in the daytime or early evening, I happened to answer the phone to someone who asked me if I was "the home owner" and I said yes. Then they said they said they were from PPI Advice Centre - the name sounds almost like a government funded company but they are actually a private claims co. I said I had an offer of over £14k that I had dealt with myself and don't have any other accounts i wish to claim for. Then they said they could get me an improved offer - some compensation too and I said how much is that likely to be and they said £2000 or £3000. Then I said there's their fee, which would be about 25% and they confirmed it was that. They must think I'm stupid because even if I do squeeze £3k more, then they would take more than £4k commission (as the percentage is presumably on the whole, not just the increased, amount) - so I said I wasn't interested but might call them if I changed their mind (which I won't!).

ims21 or dx100 or anyone, i have now had a reply from Loans.co.uk, and they have offered me the premium £9136.31 plus the interest paid on the premium to date (£884.89). They have also included interest of 8% on the payments made towards the PPI (£4848.58). They have said the "the 8% interest is paid gross and is potentially taxable, so you may need to inform Her Majesty's Revenue & Customs of this part of the payment". Would you advise me to inform them, even though in the letter it states the words "potentially and "may"? The possible tax is only on the interest, anyway. This doesn't take away from the fact that the offer is good news!! As it is their final offer, I shall of course inform them of my acceptance on their Settlement Form. I knew I had another question - and now I remember it! They state on the form "The monetary value of our offer is subject to the information Loans.co.uk (as the broker) has received from your lender & insurer and we therefore reserve the right to amend our offer should any further information arise". The broker have had 2 months to contact the lender, IGroup Mortgages (now GE Money), and the insurer, so I would think they'd have accurate information by now, especially as the account as been settled 6 years ago now? Thanks, pcb

Thanks, ims21. Should it be sent to loans.co.uk or direct to the lender? Or maybe to the broker with a copy also to GE.

I am now getting really worried about my own claim against GE Money. Loans.co.uk have chosen to act as an intermediary for this. They sent their final response letter on 30 March 2012 to state they were upholding my complaint. They wrote "the compensation we offer will be equivalent to a full refund of the initial PPI premium plus associated interest charged on that premium either to present day or to the date that the loan for the premim was settled". I have chosen, of course, to go with premium plus interest to the present day. They asked for my authority to contact my insurer and lender, and I sent them a further letter dated 16th April 2012 with the Authority Form. This is now over 8 weeks ago, or do the lender have 12 weeks to respond? How long shall I give before contacting the FOS? Thanks, pcb

Lynne49, sorry to hear about your problems with FSF. I am with them too and have been on a plan with them for just over 3 years. On going through it I think your maths is correct, although I'm not sure why there's a separate fee for a doc request as well as the doc fee. If you have been charged a fee of £755 for non-persuals it means that about £3020 has been "written off". And they have paid roughly £440 to creditors on your behalf. The rationale of paying so little to the creditors (or one of the reasons) is that some money is set aside in your ring-fenced account for full & final settlements, but you don't seem to have availed yourself of the facility. Maybe you could ring FSF and ask them if there are any creditors which they could offer 50% (or less) of the alleged debt. They would charge 25% of the money that they'd be saving you, but they wouldn't charge a 15% on top for money paid in settlement in this way. In my case some creditors have been settled via F&Fs. Also you could explore asking their legal team to assist with re-claiming any mis-sold PPI on any of your loans, or unfair charges if any are credit cards, as that could wipe out much of the existing debt too. In my case there is quite a bit of PPI on a Welcome Finance loan. Hope this helps, PCB

Dx, but would it be ok for anney63 to give us a link here to her own thread when she does start it as, you never know, there may be similarities to my current claim against GE. Mine was also a single premium and not dissimilar to that amount. pcb

Jojo224, welcome to the CAG forum as this appears to be your first post. You say "one day you rang up to find out what was going on because after 2 years you were still getting nasty letters from creditors...." Why did you not ring First Step any time within that 2 years - especially as you were getting a stack of letters from creditors with presumably interest and/or charges added? I'm sure they would have sorted that out. Also you should have been getting monthly updates from FSF or at least every couple of months. they are not perfect, but a debt solution rarely is. But they work for some people. I have also paid over £5000 in total into a plan with them, but I feel I am getting somewhere now with 9 out of 15 original debts settled or somehow resolved. Anyway, good luck with your current negotiations with your solicitor and first step.

Hi James 77, Claiming from Welcome can be a bit tricky, as the company have become insolvent and gone into administration; however, it is certainly possible and indeed I have heard that payout if successful could be in less than eight weeks, as the 'administrators' are keen to resolve quite quickly. I'm afraid I have no knowledge of the legal situation of PPI matters prior to 2003, so hopefully someone else on CAG will help... Also, if any of your loans in 2002 and 2003 consisted of consolidating another loan, do remember to reclaim the PPI on the loan that was consolidated too, as that could be hidden. Hope this helps, PCB

Diamondgirl, I may as well strike while the iron is hot as you appear to be browsing the thread right now Yes, your PM was helpful, thanks. I think, with all this feedback from nancysmile and all the correspondence they have sent her, I'll persist with the cancellation. It does seem shameless that FSF are even indirectly associated with Pickapayday Loans Ltd, and more so if it turns out their son and daughter are involved. FSF have helped me with some smaller debts, as already stated, but I'm very unsure of the longer term prognosis with the larger debts. Nancygirl, I now know what you mean by your invoking of Section 10 to them and, of course, you have my sympathies. Of course, FSF should know it is you that are calling them cos when they speak to me they simply ask for my reference number, first line of my address, postcode and my date of birth and then they're satisfied it's me they're speaking to! pcb

Dx, thanks for your reply. Good news, Loans.co.uk have said they are upholding my complaint! However, the relevant sentence in their reply goes, "The compensation we offer will be equivalent to a full refund of the initial PPI premium plus associated interest charged on that premium either to present day or to the date that the loan for the premium was settled.". I am going to respectfully say that I'm claiming interest until the present day as, after all, the provider GE have been holding on to the money all this time. The whole loan was redeemed in May 2006, but I didn't realise the mis-sold PPI was reclaimable until a few months (don't know whether I actually need to say that in a letter?). My next step is to return the Form of Authority to the broker as soon as possible so they can contact the lender and the insurer for the details. I'll send it off tomorrow at the latest. pcb

So shall I just continue with the claim? Neither party (GE or the broker) has alluded to the fact that my loan was (far) above £25k, and the single premium PPI was, very clearly, mis-sold.

I think the most I have seen, with claims companies I've personally contacted, is 33% and as already mentioned with the VAT that would make 39.6%. Even that is outrageous, and I don't think dx's slight exaggeration to 50% is significant - so I don't know why you, thebaneofbanks, are making such a thing of it. I didn't know about claims co's 'reclaiming' other monies, for themselves, that consumers didn't even know existed.

Thank you for your reply ims, and for your further response dx. Unfortunately, the loan appears to have been "Unregulated", according to the Underwriting Sheet I have - although it is "FSA Regulated". It seems strange that a mortgage of such a large amount, over £180k including the PPI, was unregulated by the CCA? So does that invalidate Section 56 in this instance? *However*, GE Money in their final response letter make no mention of the fact (if I'm right) that the loan was not regulated when they asked me to contact the broker, and neither do Loans.co.uk ... pcb

Sorry for yet another post: I have just seen on a legal website that sales of insurance before the 14th Jan 2005 were not regulated by the FSA, but self-regulated ... see the following quote

Thank you dx, but my subsequent reply dated 29/03/2012 at 14:00 has not been answered. I am also quoting sections 56 (2) and 56 (4) of the CCA: (2) Negotiations with the debtor in a case falling within subsection (1)(b) or © shall be deemed to be conducted by the negotiator in the capacity of agent of the creditor as well as in his actual capacity. (4) For the purposes of this Act, antecedent negotiations shall be taken to begin when the negotiator and the debtor or hirer first enter into communication (including communication by advertisement), and to include any representations made by the negotiator to the debtor or hirer and any other dealings between them. Should I bring this to GE Money's attention although they have sent me a "final response" letter, or pursue with loans.co.uk as they have contacted me? The trouble with the broker is that they appear to be 'under administration' by the bank of america. I don't think I can go straight to the FOS until loans.co.uk have sent me a final response letter too. PCB

Well, I'm glad I'm not using a claims company for the reclaim of PPI on my GE Money mortgage then!! Despite the best efforts of 2 or 3 of them to contact me about it... Dx, you have not answered a question I posted yesterday on the GE Money thread, which was: on the StatInt sheet where it calculates 8% simple interest, the date of the claim in one of the cells on the spreadsheet has been programmed to be "today's date" by means of a formula. Should I leave the final value to be that, or is it fairer (and more correct) to pre-date it as my original claim when it was sent to GE a couple of months ago (even though that would mean a slightly lower amount I'm claiming)? As Loans.co.uk seems now to have been taken over by the Bank of America, or at least that bank are 'administering' them, is it going to be more difficult to continue with my claim? PCB

OK so you signed a separate authority was it a separateagreement? You may potentially have a problem in that you may end upowing FSF money. The reason I say this is I am guessing you still owe Welcomemoney which means that it is more than likely that any PPI refund will actuallybe knocked off what you owe which is good for you. Unfortunately FSF will theninvoice you for 25% (or whatever there charge is) for the money that they havereclaimed for you in terms of the reclaimed PPI. One argument you will have is that they did not adviseyou of this possibility which can be easily argued is an important and materialfact/term and as such should have been disclosed to you. If all you signed wasa separate authority as opposed to a separate agreement you may well be bestadvised to cancel with FSF and so stop yourself getting into debt with them. Essentially it all depends upon what you have signed ifits a new agreement it will almost certainly contain terms meaning you have topay them for work done in the event of cancellation if its just an authority itmeans you should be able to cancel at no cost to yourself. Hope that makes sense to you [unquote] Thanks for prompt reply, thebaneofbanks. What is strange is that your response came across in the email notification to me, but seemingly not on this thread itself! Anyway, I have quoted it for reference. I signed an introductory and then a more detailed questionniare for Welcome Finance (and also for Black Horse which was resolved), so I think it is just a separate authority and not a separate agreement. I still don't think I would owe money to FSF, as I have well over £5000 in the "pot"and I estimate that the total PPI for Welcome can't be more than £300 or £400, so at the most I would owe FSF 25% of that, in respect of PPI. I could perhaps cancel that authority as a precaution, but they are bound to say I'm 'too far down the line' now as they will have been 'working' on it since Nov 2011. Indeed, I have asked FSF to forward any monies after payment of their fees back to myself. They will have received the cancellation letter as I sent it special delivery. You are welcome to look at the First Step Finance too, and I'm sure you'll be interested in recent posts thereon. Many thanks.

Thanks for replying. I have signed a separate authority (I think) including a detailed questionnaire. And I don't mind them continuing with that part of the work, as long as they don't expect me to return to FSF for the debt plan themselves for any of my creditors. What is a bit suspicious is that I returned the detailed questionnaire to them back in Nov 2011 and it should have been resolved by now (max is 12 weeks i believe). Maybe I should phone FSF, just for that purpose. For my debt, Welcome have passed it to a DCA, Empingham, but for PPI I think it would be with Welcome themselves?

Two queries from me: firstly I had a loan from Welcome and the legal team of First Step Finance are currently negotiating a refund of any PPI charges applied. Now that I have cancelled my debt elimination plan with FIrst Step will it affect the current application to reclaim missold PPI if that has been forwarded to their legal team. If so, then I would have to claim from them directrly at some point. Secondly, I have replied to you, dx, on the thread http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?328197-Reclaim-PPI-from-GE-Money&p=3781463#post3781463 - should I return requested authority from to the Broker (loans.co.uk) or go back to GE Money, although they have sent their "final response" letter? Many thanks, pcb

PS - has anyone successfully won such a claim against either GE Money or Loans.co.uk, or both?

Hi there, I did start a new thread http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?328197-Reclaim-PPI-from-GE-Money&p=3781463#post3781463 - several months ago now. However, replies seem to have dried up on that thread now! I am posting on this thread in the hope of it reaching more CAGgers who have previously posted here! Basically, I have made a claim for mis-sold PPI against GE Money, but they passed the buck onto the brokers, Loans.co.uk. They are the ones that actually sold the PPI, but I think both should have responsibility. Anyway, I was wondering if you could look at, say, the last half a dozen posts in the above thread, and give me a reply please? Many thanks, PCB

The FOS appears to think they are both responsible, and I think both the lender and the broker are responsible for this mis-selling. The actual insurer was Wessex Administration Services. The fact remains is that as Loans.co.uk have contacted me and asked me to complete a form I should return it to them before they give me a final (or any) response. In the StatInt sheet for the PPI Redress Calculation, in cell D15 the date is automatically processed as Today's Date, but is it fairer if I change the date in that cell to 08/02/2012 which is the date I made the claims application to GE Money? Do I need to (or is it better to) return my continued claim to Loans.co.uk via recorded delivery too? Thanks, pcb