Pat asked a CMC to take forward his PPI mis-selling complaint. But after the complaint deadline, it told him it hadn’t had authority to act on his behalf. We decided the CMC hadn’t properly communicated with Pat – and if it had done so, he would have taken action. We told it to compensate him for denying him the chance to make a claim.
What happened
Pat told us he was unhappy his claims management company (CMC) had failed to process his mortgage PPI claim before the deadline of 29 August 2019.
He explained that he’d completed the CMC’s online forms at the beginning of 2019, giving them authority to act on his behalf. He’d then sent some information about his mortgage in September 2019, after the deadline, which he thought would help with his case.
He told us that, having initially told him it was waiting to hear from the mortgage company, the CMC then told him that his claim hadn’t been processed – because he’d failed to give it consent to act on his behalf.
Pat complained to the CMC, but it didn’t agree it had done anything wrong. So he asked for our view.
What we did
We contacted the CMC to ask for the documentation it had received from Pat when he submitted his original claim. However, the CMC said it didn’t have any documents to provide.
Pat sent us a copy of the acknowledgement email he’d received from the CMC when he first submitted his claim. The email said the CMC had received the documentation and that it would now begin to progress his claim.
The CMC said this email was just a generic acknowledgement email – and that his application had failed its verification process. But in our view, the email not only suggested that the claim had been received, but also that it was being progressed. So it was reasonable for Pat to think everything was in hand.
The CMC told us it had tried to contact Pat, both over the phone and via text, but he hadn’t got back to them – something Pat disputed. We asked for evidence of this contact, but the CMC couldn’t provide any. We noted that Pat had proactively contacted the CMC when he found further documents that he thought might help his claim. We felt it was likely that, if the CMC had contacted him, he’d have taken the further action he needed to.
In light of this, we upheld Pat’s complaint. We told the CMC to pay compensation for denying him the chance to pursue his PPI claim.