Tony Mathers, 65 and living in Leicestershire, said that a former client had sent him the PPI claim, written on a print-out of the Financial Ombudsman Service’s template consumer questionnaire, but was not signed or dated.
On the form the client alleged that Mr Mathers had advised him to take out PPI in 1987 when he arranged his mortgage directly with the Halifax.
However, Mr Mathers said he first met the client in 1989 and had never advised any client to take PPI during his time as director of Leicestershire-based firm Mathers Harrison & Co, where he worked between 1970 and 2011.
He phoned the client and then wrote a follow-up letter on 12 June 2014 to confirm this, copying in his law firm, Rich & Carr Freer Bouskell. The letter refuted the claim and provided evidence of their first meeting and all subsequent products on which Mr Mathers had advised.
Mr Mathers called the claim “bogus and feckless” and said he has had “14 others do the same” and although these cases have been found in his favour by the Fos, “the stress of dealing with it has made me ill”.
He said although he had sorted out this latest claim, it demonstrated the “desperate need” to reinstate a long-stop, a legal provision enjoyed by legal, accounting and medical professionals, meaning any claim against an individual must be made within 15 years.
As far back as 2008, Mr Mathers had been urging his local MP, Stephen Dorrell, to push for a long-stop, claiming it was unfair to small businessmen working in financial services. He said: “I could be in a wheelchair in a care home at age 90 and get a tap on my shoulder about some claim from 40 years ago.”
Martyn James, spokesman for Fos, said: “If any complaint comes through relating to a sale in 1987, Fos would not look at it. If IFAs have never sold PPI, we want them to know Fos takes a dim view of spurious PPI complaints and would encourage all IFAs to contact our free helpline straight away so we can shut the complaint down.”
He added: “Even if we have to investigate a PPI claim and spend time on it, we will not charge an IFA a case fee because we will support the IFA against spurious complaints if they never sold the policy.”
Background
The Association of Professional Financial Advisers’s Fair Liability 4 Advice campaign, backed by the trade body, Tenet and Zurich, is set to present its case for reinstating a long-stop on advice to the FCA some time this.
Chris Hannant, director general of Apfa, said it was important for the FCA to take steps to address the current situation, with unlimited liability, higher cost of professional indemnity and the potential for spurious claims to keep haunting financial advisers.
This follows moves by the FCA earlier this year to start looking again at the question of whether there should be a time limit on how far back claims should go in relation to financial advice.
