Northern Rock shareholders threatening to block Virgin rescue package

Strikes threatened as public sector pension talks conclude

Talks over public sector pensions have now ended with the government producing a final set of proposals. While the Treasury said the talks were constructive, unions claim that ‘serious matters’ have been left unresolved, leading to the threat of further industrial action. The proposed changes to health, education and civil service pensions are designed to [...]

Payday loan company’s licence revoked

Credit broker Yes Loans has had its licence revoked by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) over concern that its business practices ‘deceitful and oppressive’. Two associated businesses, Blue Sky Personal Finance and Money Worries Limited, have also been found to be unfit to hold a consumer credit licence. Following a long-term investigation, the OFT [...]

Card fraud falls to 11-year low

The amount of money lost due to credit and debit card fraud fell to £341m in 2011. This was 7 per cent less than the amount lost in 2010 and 44 per cent lower than in 2008, when £610m was lost through card fraud. Since 2010 the number of fraudsters impersonating people to use or [...]

Pensioners hammered by QE and rising living costs

The value of final salary pension schemes has been slashed by £90 billion due to the government’s latest round of quantitative easing (QE), the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) warns, while pensioners’ incomes have also been hit by soaring living costs. A new study by LV= suggest that pensioners’ day-to-day living costs have increased [...]

Second salvo of QE knocks £90bn off pensions funds

Falling gilt yields have pushed final salary pension funds £90bn deeper into the red since the second wave of quantitative easing (QE) started last October, pension experts said today. The National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) said the Bank of England’s printing of £125bn within the past six months had hit pension funds harder than [...]

Bank of Ireland raises cost of mortgages

The Bank of Ireland has become the latest lender to increase the standard variable rate (SVR) on its mortgages. Around 100,000 UK customers will be affected when the bank increases the SVR from 2.99 per cent, to 3.99 per cent in June There will be a further increase in September, when the SVR will rise [...]

House prices down 1.1% in February

House prices fell 1.1 per cent in February according to The Halifax, contradicting earlier figures from Nationwide suggesting that property prices have increased. According to the Halifax’s three monthly index, house prices were 1.1 per cent lower in February than in the previous three months. The mortgage lender’s annual index showed that property prices fell [...]

Debit card transactions declined by Yorkshire and Clydesdale

Customers of Clydesdale and Yorkshire Bank have been experiencing problems with debit cards being declined due to computer changes. The problem initially occurred while the banks, which are both part of the National Australia Bank (NAB), were transferring their systems operations to an external contractor on Sunday morning. Problems with some Mastercard debit transactions persisted [...]

Banks write to customers over PPI mis-selling

Banks are writing to millions of customers advising them that they may have been mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI), following the release of new guidelines by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). The FSA estimates that between four million and 12 million letters will be sent out, but not everyone who has been mis-sold PPI will [...]

Confidence in pensions plummets ahead of auto-enrolement

Public confidence in pensions has fallen to an all-time low just months before the Government starts automatically putting every worker into one, new research showed today (Weds). A survey for the National Association of Pension Funds (NAPF) found 54% of all employees are not confident in pensions compared to other ways of saving. 37% said [...]