PAYMENT PROTECTION INSURANCE CONTINUES, AND MR COMEDY PUTIN

PPI COMPLAINTS STILL VERY HIGH

The number of payment protection insurance complaints fell for the first time in two years in the second half of 2013, the Financial Ombudsman said today.

The banking industry has already set aside more than £20billion to compensate customers mis-sold PPI having lost its challenge against the claim in the high court in April 2011.

The insurance policies, which were meant to protect borrowers against sickness or unemployment, were often sold to those who did not want or need the cover.

The ombudsman said it received 190,000 complaints about PPI in the second half of 2013, compared with 266,000 in the first half.

But Chief Ombudsman Tony Boorman said the rate of complaints was still ‘depressingly high’.

'We're still a long way from being able to say that PPI is sorted once and for all. Over 1,000 people every day are still asking us to sort out PPI problems that they've not been able to resolve directly with their bank,’ he said.

The ombudsman said overall it took on a record 576,000 new cases in total in 2013, up a third on the previous year.

It found in favour of consumers in 51 per cent of overall cases in the second half and in 56 per cent of cases relating to PPI.

Taxpayer owned RBS and Lloyds Banking Group, joined Barclays, HSBC and Bank of America's MBNA credit card unit in a rogues gallery that accounted for nearly seven out of ten new PPI cases in the second half of the year.

The latest figures come as it emerged some of Britain's biggest banks were still offering their staff pay incentives that could trigger more mis-selling of financial products.

The Financial Conduct Authority said today that significant progress had been made in stamping out poor selling practices, but found around one in 10 of the companies it examined still had risky sales practices.

The FCA fined Lloyds Banking Group £28million last December for the way it encouraged staff to sell £2billion of products that customers may not have needed.

Incentives included a challenge to win £1,000, known as a ‘grand in your hand’. Another was called the ‘champagne bonus’.

Britain's regulators published a review of selling practices in September 2012.

Today’s figures represent the results of follow-up checks that looked at 400 firms, nearly 800 incentive schemes and 12 company visits.

FCA Chief Executive Martin Wheatley said it would take time to see if improvements seen so far become part of a genuine cultural change or whether other pressures put on staff replace sales incentives with the same harmful effects.

The watchdog's follow-up work found banks were not checking for spikes in sales by individuals, which could be a sign that poor sales practices were being used.

Face-to-face sales conversations were also being poorly monitored in some cases and some firms were failing to recognise that pay wholly linked to sales increases the risk of mis-selling.
However the FCA was not planning any further regulation for the time being.

‘Given the progress made, we are not proposing any changes in our rules at this time but financial incentives will remain on our agenda in 2014,’ the watchdog said in a statement.

SOURCE:THE DAILY MAIL

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/news/article-2572886/PPI-complaints-fall-second-half-2013-remain-depressingly-high-City-watchdog-warns-dodgy-sales-practices.html#ixzz2v5D2dH2h

FARE DODGERS

Taxi drivers have been warned that it is not appropriate to accept sexual favours instead of fares. The warning came from Hartlepool Council after it found that this was common practice and another warning came from HMRC. HMRC are furious because they haven’t as yet found a way of taxing sexual liaisons.

Things are apparently so bad in Hartlepool that taxi drivers will no longer pick up ugly women until they have had a look in their purse to ensure that they have the full fare. They don’t demand the same from good looking women though, the other downside is that Hartlepool taxi drivers haven’t picked up a male passenger in almost six years. This has led to a lot of crossdressing in Hartlepool by men desperate to get home from the pub by taxi.

The Council has warned that any driver involved in the lieu of fare deal will lose his licence. “Good” said many of the taxi drivers because they could do with a change of career as they are completely exhausted.

RUSSIA.

President Putin gave all of its gold medallists from the Sochi Olympics a brand new £70k Mercedes. He also gave the silver and bronze medallists something too. 15 years in a Gulag in Siberia.

Meanwhile Putin explained at length at a press conference why Russia invaded the Crimea. He said “I thought it would be a bit of a laugh” adding “And it was, you should have seen the Ukranians faces”.

The rest of the world threatened Russia with economic sanctions but Putin responded saying “That is very dangerous, like what if this causes hunger and then operators sitting in front of our nuclear weapons buttons pass out through starvation and fall forehead first onto the big red launch buttons”.

The UK government aren’t that keen on suspending financial transactions with Russians because if all the Russians who have their money in London transferred that money to for instance Switzerland the city of London’s financial institutions would be left with an entire total of £7.50.

The Prime Minister said that the UK prefers to put diplomatic pressure on Russia and this will involve the Foreign Secretary William Hague visiting Putin to warn him that he will post all the photographs of “macho” Putin with his shirt off in a video montage with a sound track by the Village People on his Facebook page.

The good news for Putin though is that America said it will not take any military action against the Ukraine. The reason being that 95% of Americans have no idea where the Ukraine is on a map of the world. This put the UK’s mind at rest because given what the America military is like they’d see the UK in the Ukraine and decide “it’s probably the same place-ish”.