Your complaint and the Financial Ombudsman Service - how we can help

• If you have a complaint about a bank, an insurance company or another kind of money business – we may be able to help.
• Our job is to sort out complaints you have with money businesses.
• We are independent. This means we are separate from the business you are complaining about.
• We are free. It won't cost you any money to use our service.

We can look at complaints about:

• banks
• insurance
• mortgages (money you borrow to buy your home)
• pensions, savings and investments
• credit cards and store cards
• loans
• money advice
• stocks and shares.

Phone us on 0845 080 1800 to see if we can help with your complaint.

Can someone complain for you?

Yes. If you want to, you can ask someone in your family, a friend or Citizens Advice to complain for you.

How do we help?

We sort out complaints fairly. We listen to what you say and we listen to what the business says, and we look at all the facts.

If we think the business has treated you fairly, we will tell you why.

If we don't think the business has treated you fairly, we can make them put things right for you.

What's the first thing you should do?

Try to sort out the complaint with the business first.

If this is hard, tell us and we will say what you should do next.

Phone us on 0845 080 1800 if you need information:

• in Braille
• in large print
• on tape or CD
• in your own language

We will do our best to help you.

When can we look at your complaint?

We can do this if:

• the business has sent you a letter with its final answer to your complaint, but you're still unhappy
  or
• the business has had eight weeks since you complained but it has not sent you its final answer.

If you have had the final answer and you are still not happy, tell us as soon as you can. Don't wait any longer than six months after you get the final answer or we won't be able to help.

How can you tell us about your complaint?

Phone us on 0845 080 1800. We will need some information from you and you may need to fill in our form. This tells us about your complaint. It says what you want the business to do to put things right. We can fill in some of the information for you.

It will help if you can tell us your account numbers or policy numbers.

You can download the form from our website or phone us and we will send you a form.

What happens next?

We start by helping you and the business sort things out together.

We will:

• look at what you say
• find out what the business says
• think about what has happened
• tell you what we think.

If we think the business has treated you fairly, we'll tell you why we think this.

If it's not clear who is right or wrong, we might ask you and the business to sort things out in a way that suits both of you.

But if the business has treated you unfairly or lost you money, we'll tell them what to do to put things right.

You don't have to accept what we say. You can go to court if you want, but we can't give you legal advice.