Pensioners from Watford who were mis-sold PPI (payment protection insurance) are looking at a potential payout of over £21,000 which will include interest on the £6000 they had paid into a policy covering them for a credit card they had taken out.
The elderly couple felt that they had been aggressively sold the PPI, they had been pressurised into taking out the policy when they applied for a credit card, even though they did not need it.
PPI (Payment Protection Insurance) is a good policy for people who may not be able to repay payments in the future due to illness or redundancy. People who are not eligible to redeem PPI include self employed, contract workers and anyone who have a pre existing medical condition that may affect their ability to work. Pensioners are also ineligible to claim therefore the two pensioners who had been paying PPI payments were definitely mis-sold the PPI.
For 10 years, since 1995, the elderly couple had paid over £6000 to the PPI policy, the situation was complicated when the couple couldn’t pay off some of their credit card balance and the PPI premium increased meaning their payments increased and continued to do so.
The couple lodged a complaint with the help of their solicitor and it was very clear in this case that they had been mis-sold PPI therefore have been successful for their PPI claim for compensation. The credit card company that had mis-sold the PPI have paid back the total £6,000 paid into the premium as well as interest making the total settlement over £21,000.
In many other cases, consumers were led to believe that PPI was a condition of approval for their loan or credit card application or simply not told that it was optional. In addition, premiums were often bundled into the cost of the loan, making it difficult for customers to compare costs properly.
So far mis-sold PPI claims have reached record highs with over 2.7 million complaints between July and December 2009. Over £114 million has been paid back in compensation from banks, loan companies and credit card companies.
