Lloyds Bank attracts record complaints

The Financial Ombudsman Service has today issued figures relating to complaints received about banks in the UK. In the final six months of 2009 the ombudsman received just over 20,000 complaints regarding Lloyds bank group, split between Lloyds bank and Bank of Scotland. Over the same period the Financial Ombudsman Service revealed that Barclays bank was second in the league table with nearly 11,000 complaints received.

It is worth noting that Barclays bank received the most complaints in the first half of 2009 with Lloyds bank in second place, although these positions flip-flopped in the second half of 2009. It does not reflect very well on the likes of Lloyds Bank Group and Barclays Bank at a time when the UK banking industry is attempting to curry favour with customers and investors.

It was revealed that the ombudsman service received just over 82,000 complaints in the second half of 2009 against just under 70,000 claims in the first half. These are record numbers of complaints against the UK banking industry and serve to confirm the rock bottom contempt with which the industry is held by UK consumers and UK businesses. It will take some serious work from UK banking leaders to turn the situation around in the short term.