Complaints about discrimination

Consumers won’t always use the language of discrimination or refer to equality law.

They might simply tell us they’ve been treated differently or unfairly, or a business isn’t meeting their needs. For example, they might tell us:

• a firm wouldn’t make reasonable adjustments, for example in communications, to meet the needs of their disability
• a financial business racially profiled them
• a product or service cost more because of their age or another protected characteristic, for example, their car insurance premiums were higher
• they couldn’t use a product or service because they didn’t have access to a mobile phone, and felt excluded
• they couldn’t sign up for an account unless they selected a title or gender they didn’t identify with.

In England, Scotland and Wales, the Equality Act 2010 protects people from discrimination in the workplace and wider society.

Under the Act, any organisation providing services to the public cannot discriminate against a person because of any of the following protected characteristics:

• age
• disability
• gender reassignment
• pregnancy and maternity
• race
• religion or belief
• sex
• sexual orientation.

Financial businesses also have a duty under the Act to make reasonable adjustments to remove barriers to using their services.

Find out more about the Equality Act on the Equality and Human Rights Commission’s (EHRC’s) website.

If your firm is based in Northern Ireland, you should note that different equality law applies there.

Find out more on the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland’s website. 

Your firm also has obligations under the Consumer Duty.

This builds on the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA’s) Guidance for firms on the fair treatment of vulnerable customers issued in 2021, and makes clear that firms should:

• respond flexibly to the needs of customers with characteristics of vulnerability
• reasonably respond to their individual needs, and
• find a solution that offers effective support.   

Your firm must also ensure you support customers adequately throughout the lifecycle of a product or service after the point of sale. For example, you need to make reasonable adjustments and meet their needs if they want to make an enquiry, claim, complain or switch provider.

Good complaint handling can repair a relationship, help build trust and confidence in financial services, and give customers a better understanding of your financial products.

You should ensure your complaint handling teams fully understand what to send us when we're dealing with a complaint about your firm.

Our decisions database holds all the final decisions we’ve published since 1 April 2013. They're anonymised to protect the identity of complainants but are based on real-life complaints, so will give you a good picture of how we resolve disputes.

Our complaints data will give you an idea of the volume of complaints we receive and resolve, and the proportion that we have upheld in consumers’ favour.

We only look at complaints you've had an opportunity to look into first. If the consumer is unhappy with your decision, or you don't respond to them within the time limits, they can come to us. 

Each case is unique, so what we require will vary. But we’ll look at the facts and evidence from both you and your customer, what we consider will usually include:

• relevant laws and regulations, such as the Equality Act 2010 – only a court can find you in breach of the Act, but we will still take it into account
• regulators’ rules in place when the event happened
• guidance, standards and codes of practice in place at the time of the event
• what happened and if you followed a standard process, whether that was reasonable or whether you should have made adjustments
• how you handled things when the consumer told you they’d been discriminated against or treated differently – what you did to put things right and how quickly you responded
• whether you were aware – or should have been aware – that your customer was vulnerable, and if so what support you offered or put in place.

We may ask additional questions, or for specific information, for example, to explore whether your firm complied with the Consumer Duty.

We follow the FCA’s dispute resolution rules (DISP) and will take into account how you’ve tried to put things right. 

Complaints involving issues of discrimination can have a significant and long-lasting emotional impact. They’re often time-consuming and tiring for a consumer to resolve. If we uphold the complaint, we'll consider how the case has affected the customer’s life to determine how you should put things right. This could include:

• ensuring the consumer hasn’t lost out financially
• asking you to apologise
• asking you to pay compensation to acknowledge the emotional and practical impact
• directing you to review a decision you’ve made
• instructing you to adjust how you communicate with your customer
• compensating them for any distress or inconvenience they’ve experienced.

Businesses and consumer advisers can contact our Business Support Hub on 020 7964 1400 for information on how we might look at a particular complaint, or for guidance on our rules and how we work.

We also work with businesses and other organisations to help prevent complaints.