Grab a slice of the PPI

With just over a year and a half left to claim for mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI), Which? is urging consumers to use its free tool to recoup some of the £38 billion they may be owed by the banks.

As the total amount set aside by the big five banks – Lloyds, HSBC, RBS, Barclays and Santander – hits close to £38 billion, Which? found the median amount of money paid out for a claim was £1,600.

In a survey of 995 people who claimed for mis-sold PPI through the consumer champion’s free tool, a quarter (23%) had their claim upheld.  

Of those surveyed half (49%) of respondents were motivated by media coverage and one in five (19%) by a friend or family member. One in 10 (9%) were motivated to make a claim by the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) advertising campaign featuring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

As the deadline of the 29 August 2019 looms for people to claim for mis-sold PPI, the amount paid out since January 2011 is £28.8 billion.

Consumers can also claim for ‘Plevin’, following a recent court case – even if they were not mis-sold PPI – this is the difference and interest from mis-sold PPI where the cost was made up of more than 50% commission and the consumer was not informed. These claims can be made by anyone who has previously had PPI, making thousands more eligible for compensation.

However, Which? discovered a significant lack of knowledge of the Plevin entitlement, with 80% unaware of this potential route to compensation.

Gareth Shaw, Which? money expert, said:

“With billions of pounds in compensation still set aside to deal with the PPI mis-selling scandal, we’re urging people to use our free PPI claim tool before it’s too late.

“If you’ve had a complaint turned down by a bank and you disagree with the decision, you should take this up with the Financial Ombudsman Service.”

Successful claims

“Thank you for the use of the Which? PPI claim tool, I was successful in claiming £2218 recently. I had minimal records to go on but your on-line tool was invaluable in claiming and receiving the above amount.”

“Some weeks ago we used your form to claim back PPI from a credit card account, took about 2 minutes to complete… Within a few days we received a message from the bank saying they were investigating the claim. About 2 weeks later we received a text …. giving a total refund of over £15,000. And all that for 2 minutes work. We would like to say a massive thank you to Which?.”

Notes to editors:

  • Which? has a free PPI claim tool available at: www.which.co.uk/ppi
  • Research: Which? asked 955 of its PPI tool users who had submitted a claim in August – September 2017 about their claim.
  • The total amount now set aside by the big five banks alone for PPI compensation is around £37.4 billion, in the quarter ending in September 2017. This breaks down as follows:

o    Lloyds Banking Group has so far set aside £18 billion

o    HSBC has so far set aside £3.6 billion

o    RBS has so far set aside £4.9 billion   

o    Barclays has so far set aside £9.3 billion

o    Santander has so far set aside £1.5 billion

  • The Which? PPI tool is a simple online form that guides people through the information they need to make a PPI claim and sends the claim directly to their PPI provider, regardless of whether they have any of the paperwork or not. Major banks and building societies now signed up to the tool include Barclays, Santander, HSBC (M&S Bank, First Direct, John Lewis, HSBC), RBS (Natwest, Ulster Bank), Lloyds Banking Group (Halifax, Bank of Scotland) and Nationwide.

· According to the FCA, a total of £324.8m was paid in October 2017 to customers who complained about the way they were sold payment protection insurance (PPI). This takes the amount paid since January 2011 to £28.8bn.

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