Many of us have felt the financial squeeze this year, making it especially painful when companies unfairly withhold your money and ignore your pleas for help. <\/p>\n
Since The Times and The Sunday Times launched this column in 2024 I have fought hard for readers, winning back \u00a32,293,822 this year. This includes compensation, refunds and payouts. I have also persuaded companies to cancel unfair debt and have reunited people with their savings. <\/p>\n
Holding companies to account isn\u2019t an easy job \u2014 getting clear answers takes persistence and sometimes firms ask me not to publish complaints or threaten me with legal action. This doesn\u2019t faze me, and I\u2019ve found that those companies that are eager to brush complaints under the carpet are often trying to hide a wider problem with their business. <\/p>\n
Some have appeared in this column far more than others. Regular readers won\u2019t be surprised to know that one repeat offender is the financial group Phoenix for making terrible admin errors that have snowballed. <\/p>\n
In April I wrote about a woman who was unable to access her \u00a3120,000 income bonds because the Phoenix-owned firm ReAssure incorrectly recorded that she had died. And just this week I resolved another woman\u2019s five-year issue with ReAssure after it abruptly stopped her monthly income payments in 2020<\/a> without explanation. Even her solicitor struggled to get the company to pay her what she was owed, but with my help it was quickly put right.<\/p>\n Another Phoenix-owned business, Standard Life, made a whopping mistake with a man\u2019s pension<\/a> by letting him invest in a closed property fund. By the time Standard Life realised its error he had made huge financial decisions based on incorrect information given by the company. After my intervention the company paid him more than \u00a378,000.<\/p>\n Phoenix said: \u201cMany of the complaints we see relate to older, complex products that remain in force today. These older products can involve intricate manual processes, which sometimes lead to administrative errors. We recognise this and are working hard to simplify products and modernise systems to reduce complexity and improve customer experience.\u201d<\/p>\n My inbox has been inundated with emails from British expats living in France, Spain and Poland who have asked me to help because they have struggled to get tax rebates from HM Revenue & Customs. Despite being eligible for tax relief under special treaties between the UK and the countries in which they live, they have been left waiting for an absurdly long time for money they are owed. This year I have helped readers to get back \u00a3237,000 in tax refunds and some would probably still be waiting if I hadn\u2019t intervened.<\/p>\n HMRC said: \u201cThe vast majority of tax refund claims are paid promptly. Some cases can take longer, often to check for error and fraud to protect taxpayers\u2019 money. We\u2019re committed to cutting wait times and are investing in digital services to speed up claims and help customers to pay the right amount of tax the first time around.\u201d<\/p>\n Some of the problems I\u2019ve seen this year are not specific to one organisation but are trends in certain types of complaints. <\/p>\n Stolen identities<\/p>\n I have worked as a consumer champion since 2020 and every year I speak to more victims of identity theft whose details have been used to take out some sort of deal, such as a loan or a phone contract. When this is left unpaid it can damage their credit record and have a disastrous effect on their lives: in one case early this year identity theft had ruined a couple\u2019s chance of buying their first home<\/a> and they struggled to get the phone company Three to fix the issue.<\/p>\n It seems that some companies make it too easy to sign up to contracts, relying heavily on a simple search on a credit file \u2014 if someone knows your full name, date of birth and address they could pass such a flimsy security check. <\/p>\n It is more important than ever to keep your information safe. Phishing attacks, where a fraudster tricks you into believing they are from a genuine company to try to steal your information, are all too common. That\u2019s why it\u2019s never wise to reply to unsolicited emails or texts, and hang up if you get a call from a company out of the blue. <\/p>\n Make sure you have different passwords for all your online accounts, and set up two-factor authentication so that you have to provide another piece of information, such as a code, to gain access. Fraudsters are continually coming up with clever ways to steal your information and money.<\/p>\n Helping the vulnerable <\/p>\n I hear from many people who have done everything correctly to get the legal right to help a sick or elderly family member with their finances, only for a company to make them jump through never-ending hoops before it will carry out their request.<\/p>\n A lasting power of attorney gives someone else the ability to manage your finances, and it must be registered before you lose mental capacity. Yet even when you\u2019re armed with this document, getting companies to accept it and add it to their system is another matter entirely. This was the case with Santander in July when it wouldn\u2019t let a man move his mother\u2019s \u00a3300,000<\/a> to cover her care costs because it had failed to record him as an attorney on her account. <\/p>\n Managing your own affairs and those of a sick family member is a mammoth task, particularly when you don\u2019t have a lot of time on your hands. I\u2019m left feeling that some companies need to train their staff better, and if mistakes are made, rectify them far more quickly. After all, these are vulnerable people who are being left without the support they need.<\/p>\n Some of the most upsetting cases I\u2019ve dealt with this year have involved people who are bereaved. Take the way the care home company Morar Living treated one woman<\/a> after the death of her husband. It was heartbreaking to hear what she had been through, and inexcusable that 18 months after his death Morar Living had not refunded \u00a318,000 in unused care fees. While it paid her shortly after my involvement, no apology arrived.<\/p>\n Delivery dilemmas<\/p>\n My inbox has been full of complaints about most of the big delivery companies, mainly when people have struggled to get a refund or an insurance payout after a parcel has been damaged or lost. This year Royal Mail dragged its heels over paying a man\u2019s claim after it lost his \u00a34,000 watch<\/a>, while Evri made it difficult for a groom to get a payout after losing the \u00a31,150 suit he bought for his wedding<\/a>.<\/p>\n I was appalled to learn that a DPD driver had thrown a parcel marked \u201cthis way up\u201d over a woman\u2019s garden fence, which caused it to break open covering her garden<\/a> in the paint she had ordered, while the retailer B&Q let her down by failing to send her a replacement. Careless behaviour from delivery companies sadly seems all too common. I have my own issue with one delivery firm after it lost my sister\u2019s Christmas present then put the replacement in my bin.<\/p>\n Your consumer rights are with the retailer, which is responsible for making sure that your item is safely delivered. So if your parcel doesn\u2019t arrive as promised, the onus is on the retailer to refund you or send a replacement. <\/p>\n While it shouldn\u2019t take a journalist to get companies to do the right thing, I\u2019m always pleased when I\u2019m able to put a stop to months or years of turmoil caused by badly behaved businesses. I\u2019m glad that I am able to make you feel heard, especially when you\u2019re up against companies that have left you feeling ignored and unvalued. I would like to thank my readers and those I have spoken to this year who have trusted me with their information and allowed me to investigate on their behalf.<\/p>\n This is my last column for a while because I\u2019m heading off on maternity leave. You will be in the very capable hands of Holly Thomas, a former deputy money editor at The Sunday Times. If you have a consumer dilemma that you would like her to investigate, you can reach her at yourmoneymatters@thetimes.co.uk<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Many of us have felt the financial squeeze this year, making it especially painful when companies unfairly withhold…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":194729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[138,246,111,139,69,244,245],"class_list":{"0":"post-194728","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-finance","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-newzealand","12":"tag-nz","13":"tag-personal-finance","14":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}