Aggregate complaints data: 2019 H1

We use the complaints data to help assess how well firms are treating their customers and how their performance changes over time. We also use these data to guide our work in supervising firms and markets, and to highlight potential concerns with specific financial products.

• Key findings
• Complaints trends
• Putting complaints into context
• Most complained about products
• Outcomes for consumers
• About the complaints data

Key findings

• Firms received 4.29m complaints in the first half (H1) of 2019. Payment Protection Insurance (PPI) complaints made up 49% of all complaints received during this period.
• The volume of PPI complaints increased by 34%, from 1.58m to 2.12m between the second half (H2) of 2018 and 2019 H1.
• PPI complaints took longer on average to resolve compared to previous periods, with 24% of all complaints taking longer than 8 weeks to resolve in 2019 H1, compared to 3% in 2018 H2.
• Fewer PPI complaints were upheld in 2019 H1 compared to 2018 H2 (54% compared to 63%).
• Excluding PPI, the volume of complaints received by firms decreased by 6%, from 2.32m to 2.18m between 2018 H2 and 2019 H1. This is the lowest volume of complaints received, excluding PPI since new reporting rules came into effect in 2016.
• Excluding PPI complaints, the most complained about products remain current accounts (14% of reported complaints), credit cards (8%) and motor and transport insurance (6%).
• The average volume of complaints received per 1,000 accounts for banking and credit cards has decreased to 4.2, compared to 4.6 in 2018 H2. This was also the case for home finance, which decreased from 9.6 to 8.7 complaints per 1,000 mortgage accounts.
• The average redress per complaint upheld, not including PPI, increased from £175 to £200 between 2018 H2 and 2019 H1.

Complaints trends

Chart tips: hover over data series to view the data values and filter the data categories by clicking on the legend.

Complaints received

3,179 firms reported receiving one or more complaint during 2019 H1. 228 of these firms reported 500 or more complaints, accounting for almost 98% of all reported complaints.

Complaints closed 

Firms have 8 weeks after receiving a complaint to provide a written response. Find out more about closed complaints. 

Table 1 – Complaints closed in the period

Table 1 shows that firms closed 4.17m complaints in 2019 H1.  This is a 4% increase compared to 2018 H2. This increase was mostly due to an increase of 17% in the number of closed PPI complaints. 

Of the complaints closed, PPI complaints, on average, took longer to resolve: the percentage of complaints closed within 8 weeks decreased from 97% to 76%. For all other complaints, this percentage remained unchanged at 94%. 

Table 2 – Complaints upheld and redress paid

Table 2 shows an increase in the total redress firms paid across all products, from £2.26bn in 2018 H2 to £2.29bn in 2019 H1. This includes an increase of £12.8m in redress for PPI complaints, and an increase of £16.6m in redress for complaints about other products.

Average redress per complaint upheld, excluding PPI, increased by 14%, from £175 to £200. There is further detail provided by product group in Figure 3 (average redress per complaint upheld by product group).

As a proportion of the total complaints closed, fewer complaints were upheld in 2019 H1 compared to 2018 H2. This was the case for PPI (54% compared to 63%) as well as all other complaints (57% compared to 58%).

Putting complaints into context

As well as looking at overall complaints volumes, we look at the number of complaints as a proportion of the total number of products to which they relate. This shows the number of complaints in relation to the size of each market or firm. We record complaints per 1,000 accounts or policies in force. This improves our comparison and benchmarking of complaints across different firms. This is shown in our firm specific data.  Find out more about the contextualised complaints data submitted by firms. 

Table 3 – Contextualised complaints by product group

Table 3 shows the number of complaints per 1,000 accounts or policies in force, for each type of product and the proportion of the total volume of complaints this product group accounts for. Across all product groups, insurance and pure protection continue to receive the highest number of complaints as a proportion of the total number of products (11 complaints per 1,000 policies in force), this has increased by 15% since 2018 H2.      

Banking and credit cards make up 28% of all complaints, and receive on average 4.2 complaints per 1,000 products in 2019 H1. This is a decrease of 8.7% compared to the previous reporting period. There was also a decrease in the number of complaints made about home finance from 9.6 to 8.7 complaints per 1,000 mortgage accounts (a decrease of 9.4%).

Most complained about products

Table 4 – The 5 most complained about products in 2019 H1

Table 4 shows the 5 most complained about products in 2019 H1 and how the volume of complaints received has changed since the previous period. The volume of complaints about current accounts, credit cards, motor and transport insurance and other general insurance has decreased. The largest decrease in complaints received was for motor and transport insurance and other general insurance (a decrease of 10% for each product type).

The table also shows the percentage of complaints closed within 3 days in 2019 H1, for which current accounts have the highest percentage, at 66%.

Outcomes for consumers

This section looks at the outcomes of complaints, redress paid and complaints upheld, in 2019 H1 across the different product groups, compared to previous periods. 

Redress paid by product group

Average redress per upheld complaint

Percentage of complaints upheld by product group

Copyright

The data on this page is available under the terms of the Open Government Licence.