Complaints to financial services watchdog double

COMPLAINTS to the Financial Services Ombudsman by people sold disastrous investments more than doubled last year as more dissatisfied customers sought compensation for poor advice on how to grow their money.

Overall, the office received just under 6,000 complaints about banks, building societies and other financial institutions — a 36% increase on 2007 — but the biggest jump was in the area of investments which saw the number of cases rise from 400 to over 1,000.

Most of those cases involved out-of-pocket individuals who were unhappy with the way the risks were explained to them. In several cases ombudsman Joe Meade ordered substantial refunds of the lost money.