Complaint handling

Why choose us

We have a unique blend of experience and expertise for end-to-end support in relation to complaints handling. Our team includes a former FOS Ombudsman and former FCA Associate as well as experts in the regulation and risk management of consumer-facing products and services, including:

• banking,
• claims management,
• consumer credit (including motor finance commission),
• payment services and electronic money,
• funeral plans,
• insurance, and
• investments.

We also advise on emerging themes in complaints such as the risks of ‘ESG’-related complaints including ‘greenwashing’.

Alongside increasing regulatory pressure, claims management companies seek to convert complaints to more extensive, higher value litigation. Complaints handling can be challenging, and FOS decisions unpredictable or hard to understand.

Our complaint handling team forms part of our financial services regulatory practice, which regularly advises clients on systems and controls for complaints governance and compliance – including within the context of the Consumer Duty, operational resilience and vulnerable customer regimes – and the practical (responsive or pre-emptive) resolution of complaints, including past business reviews.

Our services

Our solutions are tailored to each client’s risk appetite and business model, enabling it to resolve complaints promptly and fairly, meeting both commercial demands and regulatory obligations.

Services we can provide on a discrete or combined basis, working alongside clients’ existing compliance, governance, legal and risk functions, include:

• Surge/overflow support: Let us act as your outsourced complaints handler. We can enhance your own processes and capabilities to respond to unexpected volumes and circumstances, providing the support you need, when you need it most.
• Customer facing communications from the first expression of dissatisfaction to final response letters (FRLs) and subsequent dialogue which, when required, are tailored in view of a firm’s house style, its products and services and its customer base (including vulnerable customers);
• Regulatory health check/root cause analysis (including evidential, contextual and statistical evaluations): Our team reviews complaints policies, processes and related documentation to ensure compliance with FCA requirements. We advise on the identification of key issues from MI. We undertake root cause analysis reviews and advise on notifications.
• Remediation programmes: Designing and implementing customer contact exercises and remediation programmes including complaint handling frameworks to deliver the proper resolution of individual complaints whilst securing consistency across complaint cohorts. We provide technical and project management support for remediation programmes, together with holistic regulatory advice.
• End-to-end complaint handling: From the first expression of dissatisfaction, we advise on next steps towards the optimal outcome. We analyse FOS final decisions and, where appropriate, advise on the potential for legal challenge.
• Helpline: We provide ad hoc advice on procedural or technical difficulties, when they occur. We help you unlock difficult complaints with pragmatic and commercial advice, as and when you need it.
• Training and legal updates: Whether to operational or executive teams, we provide targeted training, ensuring all are up to date with developments in the law and complaints framework.

We know that you won’t need all of our services, all of the time. Our flexible, modular approach allows you to select specific services or combine them in a wider package.

We would welcome the opportunity to discuss your needs and how we can support you.

Please contact one of our expert team to discuss how we can support you.

Contact us