FOS - PPI initial assessment in my favour what now

[needhelp2011]

Sorry for a rather rambling post

 

This is regarding a claim which I began in July 2011 - sent to the FOS in Oct last year. I received a phone call from FOS in Sept stating that (or so I thought ) my claim had been upheld and that they had written to the company concerned. When I received the letter it would appear that it was actually the assesor's recommendation was that the claim should be upheld. It stated that they had written to the company and had given them around 10 working days to either agree to settle my complaint as the FOS suggested, make me an offer or write to the FOS with further information. After about three weeks I rang the FOS as I had not heard anything and I was told they had not heard anything and they usually gave the companies a bit of leeway for replies as they were inundated with claims. I rang again after a couple of weeks and again they had not heard anything but had written again to the company asking them to reply soon - by this time I was getting a bit stressed about this. I left it another couple of days and rang again - still nothing but this time the call operator told me to contact the company direct and even googled the phone number for me ! So I did, obviously I assumed what the FOS told me was correct.......the company did not know anything about the Sept letter and said that they had not agreed with any assessment...............obviously I know realised I should not have rung them ! I rang the FOS back - very unhappy. They said to leave a few more days and ring again and that the previous operator should not have told me to ring the company. So I did and yet again I seemed to get someone who did not seem to be very "on the ball" about things and kept saying that they were still waiting to hear and that they would ring the company whoch they did and rang me back to say that they had left a message. I rang again a few days later to see if they had heard and yet again they hadn't. I KEPT ASKING HOW LONG DO YOU GIVE THE COMPANY's concerned but no-one seemed to know or be willing to tell me.

I made one final phone call last week and finally got someone who after looking at the case and I think they also spoke to someone else said that they would pass it to an Ombudsman athe company had not replied I knew it would take a while but again no timescales............

I received the letter saying it had been sent to the ombudsman saying that if I wished to give them more info then I had till the 25/11 to do so.................it also said that the Ombudsman could arrive at a different decision than the initial assessment.

I have three questions - I know that no-one can give me preceise answers but I am just asking those of you who have more experience in this field.

1. Do I write, fax or email them saying that I have no further info and can I request that it is passed to the Ombudsmam forthwith - or are we waiting for the Company again ! and what form of post is best.

2. How long can it take from this stage; I know that everything is different but I naively thought that as soon as I got to the phone call I received it was sorted.

3. How often are the Ombudsman decisions different to the initial assessments ?

 

Sorry don;t really want to name the company on the public forum !

 

Thank you for reading

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Sorry to say you questions would need a crystal ball and psychic powers to answer, guesses are not going to reassure or help I'm afraid.

 

I've had answer/decions in days/ weeks/ months.

[needhelp2011]

Thank you for your prompt reply - I appreciate that there is no hard and fast rule about this - I was trying more for a bit of a straw poll about the questions based on other peoples experience .

[garoowe74]

I have been recently contacted by FOS for initial assessment on a PPI dispute with one of the high street banks. they told me that in their initial assessment they would uphold my claim for compensation but would still give the bank involved until 28 Nov 2012 to respond. i called them up this week to find out if there was any progress on it. the person answered the call said they were still waiting for a response from the bank involved and if they didn't reply FOS would take it as if they didn't agree with the decision and wait for further evidence. i said how could you wait or take their non-reply as if they would contest the decision. then the person said okay, we have special team set up to chase up the banks involved after no response was receive.

he went on to say "if they contested the initial assessment, it would be passed on to FOS for final binding decision which could take another 18 months as they were inundated with so many cases like this".

 

this has made me sick & made the back of my hair stood up with fury.

 

i would keep you posted the outcome of this case as soon as there was any update.

[needhelp2011]

Join the club I sent the FOS some further information which hopefully will help my case and then spoke to the case worker involved; they still had not heard anything further from the company and they will now write again to them together with the further information and the initial assessment. This will take a further 8 weeks ! I then asked how long from then on - apparently it can take up to twelve months; I am absolutely gutted about this; my partner was made redundant 12 months ago and is now self employed - the money is coming in albeit slowly but a cash injection would seriously help. In my case they have not contested the initial assessment - they have just not done anything. I seriously think that the company involved know these time scales and are deliberately delaying everything. I feel that if the delays experienced after the initial deadline because of the FOS waiting on the company involved at least I would be a couple of months further down the road. I feel quite concerned about the differing amounts of information passed to me by the FOS staff; I appreciate that they are inundated but it would appear that more training is required. Good luck and keep me posted.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Having people to train would help.

[needhelp2011]

Wish I had a like button

 

I assume you mean that they do not have enough staff to deal with all the complaints !

 

I must say that I am a bit fed up about ringing them and having the very nice message from the Chief Executive about how busy they are and that they are employing more staff.

[BRIGADIER2JCS]

Yes it was never anticipated that this would grow so large.