The ombudsman is so concerned about this that he is due to meet the sector to discuss the surge in complaints.<\/p>\n
Around a third of all the complaints received by the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman (FSPO) last year related to insurance.<\/p>\n
Some 2,142 insurance complaints were received last year, up 18pc on the previous year.<\/p>\n
The number of insurance complaints has doubled since 2022, ombudsman Liam Sloyan said in a report on the activities of his office last year.<\/p>\n
The financial services ombudsman\u2019s office provides a free, independent dispute-\u00adresolution service for consumers and small business owners.<\/p>\n
Mr Sloyan said: \u201cThis is the third year in succession that we have seen a significant growth in the number insurance complaints received, with the number increasing from 1,129 in 2022 to 2,142 in 2025, almost doubling in just three years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis level of increase should be of concern to the industry and I will engage with the sector on this matter.\u201d<\/p>\n
The largest number of insurance complaints received related to motor insurance, followed by private health insurance and then travel insurance.<\/p>\n
More than a quarter of insurance complaints received in 2025 concerned claim handling.<\/p>\n
This was followed by complaints concerning the rejection of a claim.<\/p>\n
Customer service and maladministration and refusal to give a product or service also featured in the top five conducts complained about in 2025, as they did in 2024.<\/p>\n
The ombudsman has wide-ranging powers to deal with complaints against financial service providers. Firms can be directed to provider to rectify the conduct that is the subject of the complaint.<\/p>\n
There is no limit to the value of the rectification that can be directed.<\/p>\n
The ombudsman can also direct a financial service provider to pay compensation to a complainant of up to \u20ac500,000.<\/p>\n
Mr Sloyan said his office closed more complaints last year than ever before.<\/p>\n
There has been heavy criticism of the ombudsman\u2019s office in the last while for its slowness in dealing with some complaints.<\/p>\n
Calls has also been made for a shake-up of how the ombudsman\u2019s office operates after it was revealed that large numbers of consumer complaints are being rejected.<\/p>\n
Mr Sloyan said 6,282 complaints were closed in 2025, represents a 6pc increase on 2024 and a 34pc increase since 2022.<\/p>\n
He said the number of complaints received reached record levels in 2025 at 7,004.<\/p>\n
Nine out of 10 of all complaints that closed in 2025 closed in the early-resolution and informal processes, without requiring a formal investigation or a legally binding decision.<\/p>\n
Customer service was the most complained of conduct in 2025, with 19pc of complaints concerning an issue of customer service.<\/p>\n
Some 3,802 banking complaints were received, representing 54pc of all complaints.<\/p>\n
The number of tracker mortgage complaints the office receives each year continues to decline. During 2025, the ombudsman received 11 tracker mortgage-related complaints and closed a further 143.<\/p>\n
A third of all banking complaints received were related to the conduct of disputed transactions.<\/p>\n
This is a 28pc increase in disputed transaction-related complaints since 2024.<\/p>\n
Disputed transactions include fraudulent transactions, failure to provide accurate account information or balances, failure to provide security measures, non-receipt of money, and unauthorised withdrawals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ombudsman is so concerned about this that he is due to meet the sector to discuss the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,3361,61,60,3362],"class_list":{"0":"post-364168","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-charlie-weston","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-money-experts"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}