Are people still banging on about PPI?

Published: 13/11/2014

Yes because banks are still finding ways to deny customers money that’s rightly theirs! So don’t blame the companies that are trying to help, urges solicitor Paul Cahill. The fault of this biggest mis selling scandal in banking history falls at the feet of lenders, not the claims management companies and law firms who are working with clients to recover the money owed:

“Despite many predicting a slowdown on claims for mis sold payment protection insurance, circumstance would have it that this isn’t the case. Investigations by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the BBC have revealed further foul play; approximately 2.5million claims are now being reopened after the FCA deemed they were either wrongly rejected or underpaid. The BBC investigation meanwhile revealed banks had failed to correctly refund the additional charges triggered by PPI premiums.

“In spite of all this it is the PPI companies that are often met with antipathy, not the lenders who created and continue to create this situation.

“The root of this criticism tends to come from the fact that firms charge for this service. It’s always made me chuckle to be honest that critics get so irate about a company, with employees to pay, charging for a service. Yes, people can make a claim themselves – we have never tried to hide this. However we also appreciate that people are busy. This means jobs such as this often fall to the bottom of the to-do list and, as a result, never get done.

“Whenever questioned about our charges I always use the restaurant analogy – while you could cook your tea yourself, you decide to go to a restaurant and get someone else to do it. You wouldn’t ever expect not to pay for this so why is it different when a solicitor does all the work on your PPI claim?

“There is a reason why banks are having to continuously top up their PPI provision – it’s because more people are reclaiming than they expected – or hoped! And why is this? Because companies, like us, are not letting them get away with it.

“That’s why we’re now offering to pay for a Subject Access Request (SAR) for all our clients – that’s us paying, and no we’re not then adding this to the bill at the end! A SAR allows us to check all financial agreements the client has had to see if there are any PPI policies lurking around. It also allows us to check if any other financial products, particularly packaged bank accounts, have been sold.

“We work on a no win no fee basis. This means clients do not pay us unless their claim is successful. I am aware there are companies who charge an upfront fee - to me this is a little unscrupulous so I would urge people who are open to recovering all their money that they avoid companies such as these.”