Financial Ombudsman

[njohnson]

going to send LBA tomorrow as no reply from prelim letter to abbey. Does anyone know if should send letter to ombudsman? If so what sort of letter and when? Thanks

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	The Financial Ombudsman Service For the most part, don't bother. The Ombudsman is an industry arranged service which is under-resourced, takes too long, lacks clear transparency. You have no idea what evidence the FOS has received from the bank or how your complain has really been handled. The FOS is the preferred complaints route for the banking industry. The county court is to be preferred by consumers for its speed, openness, the quality of its awards and also because it will award 8% interest on top of any damages won by you. The Ombudsman should normally be used to solving little technical difficulties or customer service problems which you have expereinced with your bank.

[Odd Fellow]

This is my opinion only, but I think it's a waste of time contacting the ombudsmen. They must be blind, deaf and dumb if they're not already aware of all the cases against the banks.

Just sue them and if anything really exceptional happens, go to the media with the story.

[Paul10]

I think you should let the 'Ombudsmen' know that we are aware that he is not protecting the public from the 'robbing banks'. I have sent this email today:

The Financial Ombudsman Service


Dear Sir
My family bank with the Abbey.
My wife and I are very distressed that we have incurred charges of £20.00 for being overdrawn for 1 day. This overdrawn amount was incurred when Abbey paid aDirect Debit; consequently, we had an additional charge of £30.00.
We feel that Abbey should have acted in our best interest and not paid that Direct Debit. We would have preferred to have sorted this ourselves, rather than paying £50.00 in charges, plus the higher interest rate whilst overdrawn.
In our opinion (and the majority of people in this country) the charges are excessive; Abbey’s action is unreasonable and tantamount to robbery. Subsequently we will be making a claim against the bank.
We are disappointed that you have not taken proceedings to stop this form of legalised robbery. We are not going through the Office of the Financial Ombudsman as we have no confidence in him.
We are aware you receiving 150 complaints per week, The Consumer Action Group is receiving 4,000 complaints per week. In which of these two organisations do you believe the greater public confidence reposes?

	The Financial Ombudsman Service For the most part, don't bother. The Ombudsman is an industry arranged service which is under-resourced, takes too long, lacks clear transparency. You have no idea what evidence the FOS has received from the bank or how your complain has really been handled. The FOS is the preferred complaints route for the banking industry. The county court is to be preferred by consumers for its speed, openness, the quality of its awards and also because it will award 8% interest on top of any damages won by you. The Ombudsman should normally be used to solving little technical difficulties or customer service problems which you have expereinced with your bank.