Following the pattern from the second half of 2012, Santander is followed by Bank of Scotland, Barclays, HSBC and NatWest. The number of complaints against the top five most complained about home finance providers all reduced with the exception of Bank of Scotland which saw an increase.
Barclays was the most complained about bank in general in the first half of 2013 followed by Lloyds, MBNA, Bank of Scotland and Santander while on average just half of complaints were upheld.
The latest figures from the FCA revealed the five most complained about firms received a total of 1.3m complaints in the first half of 2013.
Overall consumer complaints reported by financial services firms fell by 500,000 between the second half of 2012 and the first half of 2013.
The FCA’s figures showed 2.9m complaints were made in the first half of 2013 compared to 3.4m consumer complaints reported by firms in the previous six months.
The regulator found 51% of the complaints reported in the first half of 2013 were upheld with £2.55bn of redress paid to consumers.
Nine out of ten complaints reported in the first half of 2013 were closed in eight weeks, the highest percentage since this data was first published in 2006.
Martin Wheatley, the FCA’s chief executive, said: “We expect firms to put their customers at the heart of their business – an important part of this is the way they handle customer complaints.
“Publishing complaints data is a powerful tool that helps encourage competition between firms to improve their service to customers and help consumers assess their relationships with banks and other providers.”
The most complained about product was payment protection insurance with 1,786,626 complaints opened.
Other general insurance products, current accounts, credit cards and savings accounts including cash ISAs and other banking products were also cause for customer dissatisfaction.
Firms reported payments of £2.55bn to consumers in the first half of 2013 with compensation for general insurance and pure protection products including PPI compensation accounted for £2.4bn of the total, followed by £54m for investment products and £52m for banking products, including current accounts, credit cards and savings products.
