Legal Ombudsman to accept CMC complaints

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The Legal Ombudsman will from January 2015 deal with complaints about claims management companies (CMCs).

The announcement follows the government's response to the Lord Chancellor's fee consultation about handling complaints about CMCs.

The regulations from the consultation fix the fees paid by the claims management industry to fund the Ombudsman's jurisdiction over them.

The regulations have been laid in parliament as well as in the published response.

The consultation document says: "It is now expected that the Legal Ombudsman will begin taking complaints about claims management companies at the end of January 2015. At this stage, we are working to a start date of 28 January."

In August 2012 the government announced it would commence section 161 of the Legal Services Act 2007, which meant complaints about poor customer service from regulated CMCs could be dealt with by the Legal Ombudsman.

The implementation was delayed as the proposed funding mechanism contained in the 2007 act could not be used.

Complaints about CMCs which take on a PPI case would go to the Legal Ombudsman, while the PPI case itself will continue to go to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS).

Similarly, a complaint about an insurer would go to the FOS, not the Legal Ombudsman.

Simon Tunnicliffe, head of claims management at the Legal Ombudsman said: "This is an important step forward for the Ombudsman. We look forward to playing our part in raising standards across the claims management industry, and to finally giving consumers access to redress where they have received poor service."

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