If you’re one of the millions of endowment policy holders who have lost out financially as a result of poor advice, you could be eligible for compensation and need to make a claim.

Many companies, known as endowment claims handlers, will handle the complaint and claim process on your behalf, but will charge a hefty fee for doing so. There’s no reason why you can’t do it yourself and get 100% of the compensation you’re due.

Valid complaints

The first step is to find out if you actually have a valid reason for making a complaint. To be considered for compensation you first need to prove that you were ‘mis-sold’ your policy and have suffered financially because of this, usually through a shortfall.

For mis-selling to be proved, you need to show that the risk of shortfall wasn’t properly explained, or that your attitude to financial risk and speculation wasn’t properly explored by your advisor, among other things.

Making a complaint

If you can show you were a victim of mis-selling then you can go forward with your complaint by contacting the company who sold you the endowment. They are bound by law to investigate your complaint and pay you compensation if neccessary.

If you can’t complain direct to the company, because they have since gone out of business, then in some cases the Financial Services Compensation Scheme may be able to help.

If after making your complaint, you’re not happy with the way your endowment seller handles it, then you can ask for the Financial Ombudsman Service to review your case and come to a decision which is legally binding to both you and your mortgage provider.

However, if you don’t agree with the decision, you still have the option of continuing on to court with a private civil action against the endowment company, although the chances of success after a negative decision by the impartial ombudsman are probably low.

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