Peter Edmonds of the FSA gave the update on the ICOB review. He said the FSA’s intention was to adopt a principles-based approach which focused on outcomes for the consumer but offered flexibility on how they were achieved. A consultation would be issued later in June with view to a policy statement with final rules published by the end of 2007. Fiona King also from the FSA updated the conference on the latest developments of the third phase of the PPI thematic reviews.
Peter Tutton from Citizens Advice urged industry to address the problems the bureaux encountered with PPI. Although he acknowledged significant progress had been made, he felt the time was right to consider what further steps were needed to improve the product and restore consumer confidence.
According to Peter Hinchcliffe from the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS), PPI was not the largest source of complaints but was a growing category. In particular the FOS was seeing more complaints around the sales process, which were more likely to find in favour of the consumer, than grievances around claims.
The day ended with Brian Brown of Defaqto. He regarded PPI as “a seriously ill” product heading for a slow death. However there was an opportunity to regain consumer confidence by embracing treating customers fairly properly, explaining PPI and how it worked and producing an annual report. He envisaged new products entering the market, for example standalone PPI and more short-term income protection.
