London-based Satish Sekar said he will appeal the Fos ruling, despite it finding in his favour, saying he found the compensation sum “slightly offensive”, given that he felt there were multiple claims dating back to 2007 and that he had expressed concerns over bank procedures.
In 2006 Mr Sekar opened a joint account with Barclays in his and his mother’s name to pay for her care bills.
Later that year Mr Sekar’s brother Chandra Sekar was given third-party authority on the joint account and on 9 January 2007, Satish Sekar went to a Barclays branch to confirm that his brother should not be given third-party access to his personal current account as well.
Mr Sekar then discovered the primary correspondence address on his personal account had been mistakenly changed to that of his brother’s when a payment bounced in November 2007. He was subsequently offered £77 compensation by Barclays.
But Mr Sekar alleged that Barclays refused to take responsibility for the mistake. Following several subsequent letters of complaint, and an offer of £350 redress from Barclays, he took his case to Fos.
The ombudsman investigated the claims and in a letter dated 4 March 2014 it stated in regards to Mr Sekar that “there is no dispute that Barclays has breached the Data Protection Act by allowing your brother access and control of your accounts without your authority”.
The letter stated that Fos did not believe the £350 offered by Barclays was “sufficient to reflect the distress and inconvenience that its errors” had caused Mr Sekar and said it would recommend Barclays made an offer of £500 compensation instead.
But Mr Sekar said: “I am rejecting the ombudsman’s ruling both on grounds of amount and on grounds that it has not brought Barclays to account in terms of improving procedures.”
Right to reply
A Barclays spokesman said: “We take all customer complaints seriously and endeavour to make sure that, along with finding the immediate resolution, we tackle the root cause of the complaint head on to prevent other customers from being affected.”
A statement from Fos said: “If we decide that the bank has made a mistake, we will put the consumer in the position they would have been in had the error not been made. In some cases we may think it is appropriate for the consumer to be awarded a payment for distress and inconvenience. However, this award is not intended to penalise the bank – that’s the role of the regulator.”
