COMPENSATION AWAITS
There is £4 billion -
£4,000,000,000 to claim back! I am not making it up. Thats the official
figure as published by the City watchdog the Financial Services Authority. And
the average for the two million and a half million who can claim it will be
close on £1000 or £2000 depending on circumstances. Final details have not yet
been issued it will be another couple of months or more before that happens.
But you can claim now if you think you may be due compensation.
The compensation will be paid
to people who were sold insurance to protect their payments when they took out a
loan or credit agreement in the last five years. This so-called payment
protection insurance, or PPI, sounds a good idea until you read the small
print. Many people (including those who do not work or are retired) are excluded
from claiming but were still sold the policies. Many others who appear eligible
are refused pay outs because they had existing medical conditions (often
irrelevant ones) or lost their job in the wrong way. And even those who make
successful claims often find that the insurance only covers the interest on the
loan for a limited period. On top of that the cost of the insurance was
sometimes as much as ten times the market rate.
Now, after research, reports,
and tens of thousands of complaints almost all of which are upheld the
Financial Services Authority has finally decided to get tough. It is planning to
make companies who sold PPI (a) to review all past sales (b) to review all past
rejections of complaints and (c) to contact anyone who they think may have been
mis-sold this product. But that will take a long time. So my advice is that
anyone who has taken out a loan, a credit card, a mortgage, or any other
borrowing in the last six years should see if they were sold insurance at the
same time. If they were that could well have been a mis-sale and compensation
could be due. Two independent guides as to what to do are at
www.moneysavingexpert.com/reclaim/ppi-loan-insurance and at
www.which.co.uk/advice/how-to-tell-if-youve-been-mis-sold-ppi/index.jsp. And
remember that if you were over pension age or retired it was almost inevitably a
mis-sale.
Final warning. Never go to a
commercial company to help you make the claim. They charge you money for doing
something you can do free yourself. Claims put in by companies stand no more
and sometimes less chance of success than ones put in by individuals. Some
firms even charge you a fee before your claim is successful. Avoid them.
More information:
www.fsa.gov.uk/pages/Library/Policy/CP/2010/10_06.shtml
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