The power to settle financial complaints.
The power to settle financial complaints.
The Financial Ombudsman Service was set up by parliament to settle disputes between businesses providing financial services and individual consumers. We are completely independent and impartial.
To carry out our functions effectively, we need to co-operate and communicate constructively with a number of organisations, including official bodies like the Financial Services Authority (FSA) and the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), as well as other ombudsman schemes.
We have entered into a number of memoranda of understanding (MoUs) with relevant bodies – and we are in the process of drawing up a number of others. These MoUs provide the operational framework for the relationship between the Financial Ombudsman Service and each relevant body, and also cover any arrangements for the exchange of information.
We have entered into MoUs with the following bodies:
So far as our separate and independent roles allow, we liaise and co-operate closely with the FSA and the OFT on issues that affect each other's work.
Our three organisations have described how we do this in the feedback statement (published in March 2011) in response to proposals set out in the earlier Discussion Paper 10/1.
This work includes a co-ordination committee made up of senior staff from our three organisations. The purpose of this committee is to help to identify emerging issues that could lead to widespread consumer detriment – and to co-ordinate each organisation's separate response to these.
The committee met substantively for the first time in February 2011, after two pilot meetings in 2010.
Further guides and statements on our work with other bodies include:
a joint note from the Claims Management Regulator (the Ministry of Justice), the FSA, the Financial Ombudsman Service and the FSCS
produced jointly with the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) and the Financial Services Authority (FSA), this guide explains the separate roles of our three organisations – and how and when we liaise and work together
a statement from the FSA and the OFT outlining their respective roles and responsibilities – and mentioning the role of the Financial Ombudsman Service