The Financial Ombudsman Service has published its proposed budget plan for the forthcoming financial year, April 2004 to March 2005.
It said the budget proposals showed the cost of handling complaints at the ombudsman had fallen, with the average cost for resolving a dispute having dropped from £753 three years ago to an estimated £507 during the 2004 financial year.
The ombudsman also said it proposed to stop charging financial firms case fees for the first two complaints referred to the ombudsman service each year. It said the change would benefit those firms whose customers only rarely refer complaints to the ombudsman.
It said the reduction in the cost of handling disputes resulted from continued improvements in productivity, as well as the cost of its services being spread over the much larger number of complaints that it now handles.
The ombudsman said that by the end of March 2004, it expected to have resolved and closed around 80,000 complaints, a 40% increase on the number of complaints resolved in the previous financial year. It predicted that by March 2005, it will have resolved around 88,000 complaints.
