The Conservative Shadow Treasury Minister is calling for complainants to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) to pay a refundable fee, in an attempt to stop the number of unnecessary cases taken against independent financial advisers. Currently, anyone making a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service does not have to pay a fee, while financial advisers have to pay a fee of £360 regardless of whether the complaint is upheld or not. Under the new proposals, an initial fee would be payable by the complainant, which would be refunded if the complaint was upheld. The FOS estimates that 108,000 complaints will be made this year, with only 30-40% being upheld.
Our view:
We believe this is a sensible move. There are many who have jumped on the compliants bandwagon when they were not mis-sold or mis-advised and are just 'chancing there arm'. Likewise, there are many genuine. Those that have a genuine complaint will still make their formal complaint.