How many complaints about Pet Insurance have you upheld in favour of the customer?

The request was successful.

Dear Financial Ombudsman Service Limited,

Please can you provide me details of the following for each of the last 5 years?

1) How many complaints you have received about Pet Insurance?
2) How many of those complaints (ref 1 above) were found in favour of the customer (policyholder) for each of the last five years and of those how many were after an appeal of the original rejection by the FOS?
3) How many of those complaints were found in favour of the insurance company for each of the last five years?
4) Which insurance company was the most complained about for each of the last five years?

Yours faithfully,

Andrew Wallis

DataProtection, Financial Ombudsman Service Limited

Dear Mr Andrew Wallis

 

Thank you for requesting information under the Freedom of Information Act
2000. We’ll respond as soon as we’re able to and by 21 May 2021.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Ross Gallagher | Data Protection and Freedom of Information Coordinator
Financial Ombudsman Service| Exchange Tower | London | E14 9SR

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scrupulous Landlord left an annotation ()

The FOS may be justified in refusing this request under section 21 FOIA on the basis that the information is already published or they may cite other sections which state they do not have to create new data so it will be interesting to see what reply they do give.

DataProtection, Financial Ombudsman Service Limited

1 Attachment

Dear Andrew Wallis

 

Please find attached our response to your freedom of information request.

 

Kind regards,

 

Anna Bourlet | Data protection and freedom of information adviser

Financial Ombudsman Service | Exchange Tower, London, E14 9SR

Email: [1][email address]

 

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Dear Financial Ombudsman Service Limited,

Thank you for the information and the timeliness of your response.

Unsurprisingly the insurance company most complained about for the last three years, Red Sands Insurance Company - or Waggel - with whom I had a complaint. I was, as to be expected, in the 70% that you don't uphold yet they are the most complained about. Telling all round.

Yours faithfully,

Andrew Wallis

scrupulous Landlord left an annotation ()

I agree that your specific request has a wider significance so you have acted in the public interest. The "general insurance" category accounts for less than 10% of the FOS workload but is the most complained about category.

I believe it is not a co-incidence that the former CEO & Chief Ombudsman, Caroline Wayman, and the person who describes himself as the "Ombudsman Leader & Head of Practice (Rules & Jurisdiction)" in some sources , but is not described in that way by the FOS, both came from the Insurance Ombudsman Service.

My theory is that the the FOS's operational model and business plan is based on the Insurance Ombudsman model which would explain the large number of inconsistencies I have identified.

If you (Andrew Wallis) are interested, you may make a follow up request for information to ask the FOS my assumption is true. You may also ask them why the do not publish what percentage of Final Decisions are rejected by the complainants. The fact that only the complainant can reject a Final Decision is the FOS's unique sales point ,or USP, but they go to great lengths to distract attention away from this major benefit to the consumer.

Another statistic the FOS do not publish is what percentage of "opinion for both parties" are rejected by the complainant and cannot be extrapolated from the data they publish.

The related statistic of what percentage of "opinion for both parties" are rejected by the firm is also relevant because the regulated firm can reject a "determination", to use the legal phrase, at that stage.

I can quote the relevant rules from the FCA Handbook if necessary.