Financial Ombudsman - Time to take it further

[citizenB]

OH's complaint was made to the Financial Ombudsman in July 2008. Since then they have managed to "lose" two packages of documents despite agreeing that they have been received and signed for.

 

A further letter received from them in December 2009 advised they had "lost" more information. Although they soon found it when I suggested a formal complaint would be made due to their incompetence.

 

I am just about to send an email asking if OH's complaint is now being addressed or has it been put to the bottom of someone's in tray for a further 18 months.

 

They were made aware last year that the bank being complained about had threatened legal action and implied that they do not have to wait for the Ombudsman !!

[citizenB]

I sent an email to the FOS asking them to confirm that my complaint had actually been allocated now and was not just languishing at the bottom of someone's in tray.

 

No response received so yesterday I telephoned.

 

Me: With reference to my husbands complaint. Can you now confirm that this has been assigned to an Adjudicator and give me a target date for completion.

 

FOS Rep : I am very sorry, but no, I cant. Due to the unprecedented amount of complaints.

 

Me: You have had this complaint since July 2008. In October 2008, John Compton wrote to me advising he was the adjudicator handling the complaint.

 

On 26 November 2008, Llion Griffith, left urgent messages on answermachine, mobile voice mail and email saying that this was no longer the case and that due to the specialised nature of the complaint it was being passed to another department. That another adjudicator would contact me. That was 14 months ago. And could you advise what is the "specialised" nature, please.

 

REP : Well it is a PPI claim.

 

Me: It has always been a PPI claim, aside from the fact that this was mentioned in the covering letter, why did it take the FOS 5 months to notice this ?

 

REP: I cant answer that question, nor can I give you a target date.

 

Me: Would you please go and find someone who can answer those two very simple questions then ?

 

REP: No one will be able to give you a definitive date.

 

Me: Can you at least confirm that this complaint HAS indeed been allocated to an adjudicator.

 

REP: I can confirm that it is waiting allocation.

 

Me:. Ok, it would appear we are going round in circles here. I must advise you that I am not happy at all with either the length of time you have had the complaint so far or the inability you personally have in answering a simple question.

 

I would also point out that on no less than 2 separate occasions you have "lost" documents even though the FOS has acknowledged receipt of them, having confirmed indendantly that they were received and a signature obtained via the Royal Mail Website and by your own postal traffic logs.

 

I will be making a complaint in writing to the Ombudsman and feel it only fair to let you know that I will also be contributing to a group complaint that is being compiled by an online consumer action group.

 

The line went dead at that point and to be honest, I dont know whether he hung up on me, before I hung up on him ??

 

 

 

I am now going to be making an official complaint to the Independant Assessor. I imagine that the Financial Ombudsman is well aware of my frustration at their handling of the case so far.

 

 

 

CitB-

I suggest that you make an immediate compalint to the Independent Assessor

 

 

The Independent Assessor reports formally to the board of the Financial Ombudsman Service - which publishes his report in full each year as part of the Financial Ombudsman Service's annual review [43][44][45][46][47][48].

Mr Barnes' track record so far is to uphold in part or fully between 10-15% of complaints about the ombudsman's service quality.

The Financial Ombudsman - from Wikipedia

 

read the links in the quote above. The address is in link

 

Address for Independant Assessor

Edited January 23, 2010 by citizenB