Abdul said the reforms proposed by the Chancellor were a “big shift psychologically because the ombudsman is well established in the market as a really user friendly service for consumers”, adding, “it did strike me as quite a fundamental move to shift some of the balance away from the consumer.”
Commenting in relation to the Treasury’s recently published review of the FOS and a proposed framework to clarify the relationship between it and the Financial Conduct Authoruty, Abdul said such changes would likely “flip the balance in favour of institutions”, and that the FCA would become “the referee” when interpretations of regulations comes under dispute.
Abdul also said the outcome of the Treasury’s review “largely recognised the incredibly important role that the FOS plays,” and the “momentum” is with the FOS to continue “in some form or another” as it serves an important role in diverting disputes away from the courts system.