The UK financial services industry has been hit by a blizzard of nine million formal customer complaints in the past three years, figures revealed today.
The data, which has never been published before, from the Financial Services Authority (FSA) reveals the scale of customer dissatisfaction in the UK and shows that it is getting worse.
Complaints in the second half of 2008 grew by 5.8 per cent to 1.48 million — equivalent to more than 8,000 every day — with banks repsonsible for two in every three complaints.
Banks, building societies, insurers and retail investment firms have for years provided the FSA with complaints figures, but these have been kept confidential until now, with the publication of aggregated figures. Next year, the FSA goes a step further and will publish complaints data for individual firms.
Over three years, complaints about current accounts were by far the most common, accounting for 3.5 million complaints. Mortgage endowments, credit cards, general insurance and car insurance also elicited a huge volume of unhappy customers.
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The speed of complaints handling was roughly stable, as was the proportion of complaints upheld in the customer’s favour — about 40 per cent.
Alleged delays, disputed amounts, misleading advice, administrative failings, overcharging and poor customer service were the most common gripes.
Standards needed to improve, the FSA said.