Financial complaints to be revealed

Data showing which financial services providers have received complaints and which have been justified are to be published by the Financial Ombudsman Service.

People will be able to access the information, which will be published every six months, starting in September.

However, only companies which have at least 30 new complaints against them and at least 30 cases reviewed, will be included.

Firms will be put into five main product areas, including insurance, investments and banking, and complaints will feature under companies' trading names, as opposed to individual brands.

Consumer group Which?, has backed the move and said it felt the information would help consumers make a decision about which companies to deal with.

Vera Cottrell, Which? personal finance campaigner, said: "Forewarned is forearmed, so publishing details of complaints could help consumers to make more informed choices about the financial firms they deal with.

"However, we think these proposals could go much further. Having a threshold of 30 complaints before a firm is named means that smaller companies could continue to get away with murder and no one would know."

The group also said it would be more helpful to consumers if the figures were published under brand names, rather than group names, as many large groups operate several different brands.

The industry has expressed concerns about the plan to publish complaints data, arguing that it could undermine consumer confidence in the financial services industry as a whole, further increasing the saving and protection gap.

There are also worries that the publication of the figures could increase the number of complaints made against firms, as it would help claims management companies identify particular businesses to target.

The data may also encourage financial services firms to settle unjustified complaints to prevent them from going to the ombudsman service and being recorded, or appealing more cases that do go to the ombudsman, so that the whole process takes longer.

But the ombudsman defended the plan, saying that the publication of data on complaints referred to it would encourage firms to deal with complaints properly in the first place.