If you took out a PCP or HP car, van, motorhome, or motorbike finance agreement before October 2024 in England, Scotland or Wales and used the vehicle mainly for personal use, you may be eligible to claim:

• if you paid a discretionary commission, pursuant to which the lender motivated the dealership to charge you higher rates for the finance: this practice was banned in January 2021;
   
• if your finance agreement was unfair due to high commission (where the commission is equal to or greater than 35% of the total cost of credit and 10% of the loan); or 
   
• your finance agreement was unfair due to a tied commercial relationship between your lender and the dealership from which you bought the vehicle which gave the lender exclusivity or a ‘right of first refusal’. Find out more information on eligibility here. 

If your claim is successful, we will charge:

• 30% + VAT, up to a maximum of £420, of the amount of compensation between £1 and £1,499 you are awarded in relation to a motor finance contract;
• 28% + VAT, up to a maximum of £2,500, of the amount of compensation between £1,500 and £9,999 you are awarded in relation to a motor finance contract;
• 25% + VAT, up to a maximum of £5,000, of the amount of compensation between £10,000 and £24,999 you are awarded in relation to a motor finance contract;
• 20% + VAT, up to a maximum of £7,500, of the amount of compensation between £25,000 and £49,000 you are awarded in relation to a motor finance contract; and
• 15% + VAT, up to a maximum of £10,000, of the amount of compensation you are awarded in relation to a motor finance contract above £50,000.

There are no upfront costs. If you do choose to cancel your claim with us after 14 days, we reserve the right to charge you a cancellation fee of £75 + VAT per claim as a contribution to the time spent and expenses incurred regarding your claim.

Harcus Parker is a London-based litigation firm which is recognised for its specialism in complex, large-scale group actions. By choosing Harcus Parker, you benefit from:
 

Certainty

Although the terms on which the FCA is consulting include a requirement that lenders should contact and try to trace their customers, there is no certainty that your lender will locate you, particularly if you have moved or changed your name or your agreement concluded more than six years ago and records have been destroyed. The proposed scheme rules also require you to respond; and if no contact is made, you will receive nothing unless either you, either directly or through a representative, contact your lender with your relevant details. On the present proposals, if no contact is made within 12 months of the start of the scheme, you will lose your chance to claim.

Speed 

The FCA has stated that if consumers have complained before the commencement of the redress scheme, they are likely to receive redress sooner.

Less hassle

You do not need your old paperwork. We manage the entire process for you, using technology to progress your claim efficiently, from identifying your claims and submitting them to the defendants, to making all necessary representations, to distributing compensation if you are entitled to it.

Verification and accountability

The proposed calculation methodology is complex. We can check the defendants’ calculations and require the defendants to disclose the information on which they are based to ensure that you receive the correct amount of redress.

If the FCA’s proposals are implemented, the redress scheme will essentially be ‘lender-led.’ You may not trust lenders, who acted against your interests in the first place who would be in charge of leading the proposed scheme, to do the right thing now. 

Legal expertise

We have in-depth knowledge of the laws and regulations surrounding motor finance claims.
 

Potentially stronger claims and alternative claims

If a lender denies wrongdoing, claims not to have information or does not offer what we estimate to be the correct amount of compensation, we can challenge their decision. Note that we are not saying that we will achieve a better result through the redress scheme than the redress scheme rules dictate. We can, however, hold the defendants to its terms.

Issues we may be able to assist with include:

• the FCA’s consultation suggests that it will be possible for some consumers to object to the proposed rate of compensatory interest, which is just 1% over the Bank of England base rate. Consumers who will be able to argue for a higher rate are those who can claim that they had to borrow money at a higher cost as a result of not having money available that they should have had. We can help with the presentation of relevant evidence;

   

• irresponsible lending: if it appears that, because of your personal circumstances, you should never have been offered the lending in the first place then, outside of the redress scheme, we may be able to bring a different and more valuable claim on your behalf;

   

• the method  of calculating interest: we can check whether the interest was calculated correctly in accordance with your contract. If it was not, it may be possible raise additional issues outside the scheme;

   

• when we request disclosure from the defendants, we can also ask for disclosure of commissions within any insurances or products you financed, including GAP insurance, paint insurance and alloy wheel insurance; and

   

• some clients may have paid commissions at a level which makes it worth their while to seek compensation through the courts instead of accepting a redress payment that is lower than a court would award – we can advise on this and act in appropriate cases in which it is in the client’s interest to opt out of the redress scheme and accept the inevitably longer and riskier process of litigation.

   

A risk-free service

No upfront costs. Most clients will pay between 28-30% (plus VAT) of their compensation to Harcus Parker, unless in your case we agree that the litigation route is advisable. For a full explanation of our fees, click here. Note that it is possible to claim yourself without charge.
 

Multiple claims

We can handle all your claims for you, even if you borrowed from multiple lenders, and even if some of your agreements date back to as long ago as 2007, we could find and present evidence for you to substantiate a claim.
 

A stress-free service

Dealing with bank correspondence and legalese can be daunting. Our experienced team and technology can handle it all for you. Even though the FCA is attempting to create as simple and straightforward a scheme as possible, and has said it will require lenders to write to affected consumers within 6 months of the introduction of a redress scheme (or 3 months if you have already complained), you will still have to engage with the scheme itself and communicate decisions about issues including whether you wish to ‘opt-in’ and make a complaint if your lender contacts you, or whether you wish to ‘opt-out’ if you have already made a complaint.

The FCA accepts (as we believe is inevitable) that not everyone will receive correspondence from their lender and has encouraged consumers to make complaints if they can before any redress scheme begins. It has pointed out that in order to make a claim yourself without charge you will need to track down your lender and see if you can find a copy of your finance agreements. In an advertisement issued before the consultation document, the FCA has suggested that you could try checking old bank statements, as the lender should be named there; you can ask the dealer from which your purchased the vehicle for details; or, if the agreement was within the last 6 years, you can check your own credit file. The FCA points out that the Information Commissioner’s Office (‘ICO’) has information on how to obtain one's credit file here.

The ICO gives guidance as to how to make a Data Subject Access Request (‘DSAR’), and also notes that most of the credit checking agencies have a facility for people to access their own file without making a formal DSAR. 

Or we can help.

The practices which give rise to motor finance claims were current between 2007 and 2021 in the case of discretionary commissions (the FCA only banned discretionary commission arrangements in January 2021 after a review that began in 2016) and October 2024 in the case of the practices of charging very high undisclosed fixed commissions and failing to disclose a tied commercial relationship between dealership and lender which gave the lender exclusivity or a right of first refusal.

In January 2024, the FCA announced it was considering a redress scheme for affected borrowers. As a result, complaints have been paused, and many consumers are now coming forward to claim back the money they have been overpaid. The FCA is now consulting on a redress scheme. The consultation will end on 18 November 2025. All parties expect any scheme to be in place by early 2026.

At this stage, it is hard to estimate what claims may be worth, and we stress that not all claims will automatically succeed. All claims will turn on their own facts.

If you are entitled to compensation, the FCA has stated, in its announcement on 7 October 2025 that it considers that consumers will receive, if they had a finance agreement subject to a discretionary commission an average of £700, with many customers receiving more and a large number less. We do not, however, expect that most consumers will receive precisely the ‘average’ figure. Given the popularity of PCP / HP motor finance agreements, and since the claim period goes back to 2007, many clients will have more than one claim.

We note that in 2017, a survey conducted by the FCA based on evidence drawn from 16,000 contracts found the average overcharge as a consequence of Discretionary Commission Arrangements was £1,100 on a £10,000 loan. One reason why the FCA is now quoting a lower figure is that claims now extend beyond Discretionary Commission Arrangements to commission arrangements that were unfair for other reasons; another is that its proposals include the introduction of the concept of an ‘APR adjustment’, which has the effect of reducing redress levels in many DCA cases by around 30%. The factors which will affect the value of your claim include: the rate of interest payable, the date of your contract (since your compensation should be increased by interest from the date of the end of the contract, which is proposed to be calculated at the rate of 1% over the Bank of England base rate from time to time unless you are able to demonstrate that you borrowed money at a higher rate as a consequence of having less money available to you because of the excessive cost of your motor finance agreement) and the size of your loan. We understand that some of the proportionally highest commissions were charged on relatively small loans, so there may not always be a direct relationship between the value of the contract and the size of the claim.

Some lenders motivated dealers to increase your interest rate to earn commission — without telling you. These undisclosed arrangements, called Discretionary Commission Arrangements (DCAs) or Difference-in-Charge commissions (DICs), were banned by the FCA in January 2021. If you were affected, you are likely to be entitled to compensation.

Other lenders paid excessively high levels of fixed commissions which affected the cost of your lending. The FCA has decided that the threshold above which redress should be paid is when the commission was equal to or greater than 35% of the total cost of credit and 10% of the loan.

And others had tied commercial relationships with dealerships which either gave them exclusivity or a right of first refusal. This practice also led to consumer detriment.

Depending on your situation, the duration of the claim process will vary. This is because of a number of reasons. The FCA has imposed a blanket ‘pause’ which means that banks and lenders are not required to issue final responses to complaints until December 2025. The FCA is currently consulting to extend that pause until 31 July 2026. Once the FCA puts in place its redress scheme, expected in early 2026, the consultation documentation states that lenders are expected to contact all clients who have not made a complaint within 6 months and ask whether they wish to ‘opt-into’ the redress scheme. Any consumer that has made a complaint before the redress scheme begins will be contacted within 3 months and be asked whether they wish to ‘opt-out.’ They will have one month to respond, after which time they will be considered to have opted in.

At this stage, it is expected that complaints will be resolved within 3 months of a consumer’s agreement to be subject to the redress scheme; and if a consumer is eligible for redress, payment should be made within 1 month. We caveat this by observing that it seems likely to us that in the early days of the scheme there will be delays whilst the lenders’ administrative processes are tested and until the substantial backlog of cases that have been awaiting a final response since January 2024 are cleared. Whilst we expect routine complaints to be resolved quickly (and the redress scheme has been designed with the aim of ensuring that most complaints are treated as routine) complex cases will take longer, especially in cases where we may require further details from you.

Mis-selling is something of a misnomer. These claims arise from the charging of hidden commissions that made motor finance more expensive than it should have been. The hidden nature of the commissions means that you cannot know if you have a valid claim without first obtaining disclosure of what commissions, if any, and what type of commissions your dealership received from your lender. 

You may have a valid claim if:

• Your interest rate was higher than necessary.
• The dealer or broker earned a commission but did not disclose it to you.
• You were charged a high commission (which the FCA defines in its consultation as a commission equal to or greater than 35% of the total cost of credit and 10% of the loan).
• contractual commercial ties that gave a lender exclusivity or a right of first refusal.

As part of instructing us, we will write to your lender and make enquiries as to the full circumstances of your agreement. 

Because these are claims concerning undisclosed commissions, you cannot know (and nor can anyone tell you) whether you have a valid claim without first checking with your lender.

The FCA’s consultation proposes that lenders should write to all affected consumers (if they can contact them) within 6 months of the beginning of the proposed redress scheme (or within 3 months if a consumer has already made a claim).

We anticipate that many consumers may miss out though. Consumers may not receive correspondence informing them they have a claim; others may miss out because they may have to take an active step in order to receive compensation.

The FCA has suggested that consumers should not delay in making a complaint if they consider they are eligible, and says that early complaints will be resolved sooner than later complaints.

Although a model letter published on the FCA’s website suggests consumers should provide lenders only with their current and past addresses and registration number, that of course assumes that the consumer knows who their lender is. The FCA has previously stated that to make a claim yourself without charge you will need to check to see if you can find a copy of your finance agreements. You could try checking old bank statements, as the lender should be named there; you can ask the dealer from which you purchased the vehicle for details; or, if the agreement was within the last 6 years, you can check your own credit file. The FCA points out that the Information Commissioner’s Office (‘ICO’) has information on how to obtain one's credit file here. The ICO gives guidance as to how to make a Data Subject Access Request (‘DSAR’), and also notes that most of the credit checking agencies have a facility for people to access their own file without making a formal DSAR.

Or we can do this for you.

A DCA is a commission structure through which the dealer could set or influence the interest rate offered to the customer, with their commission increasing if a higher rate was agreed. This in our view created a conflict of interest, as dealers were motivated to encourage customers to agree to higher rates. We discuss the legal and regulatory implications of DCAs below.

To put this another way – what is wrong with discretionary commissions (DCAs)? In answering this question below, we are not giving legal advice but are providing our view on the situation in general. Nor are we saying that all claims will succeed (albeit that in the redress scheme context, any claim that falls into one of the three categories selected by the FCA should qualify for redress). Each claim will turn on its own facts. 

With these caveats, the essence of these claims is that the lender should take responsibility for having established a scheme of payment of commissions which disadvantages the customer.

If a secret ‘Difference In Charge’ commission, or 'Discretionary Commission Arrangement' was associated with a consumer’s credit agreement, parallel and overlapping claims in law / regulatory complaints arise. 

There are two routes to liability in relation to DCAs, now that the Supreme Court has confirmed, in its judgment handed down on 1 August 2025 in Hopcraft, Johnson and Wrench that there is no claim for breach of fiduciary / disinterested duties.  

1. Financial Services Regulations (the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 / the Financial Services Handbook, and in particular, CONC, the Consumer Credit Sourcebook. These, in combination, create a direct claim against the lender on the part of a consumer. 
   (It is not necessary in our view to look further than here when considering a discretionary commission claim.)
2. The Consumer Credit Act 1974, in particular ss140 A and B, which set out provisions to rectify unfairness in the relationship between borrower and lender. 
   (The Supreme Court upheld Mr Johnson’s claim under this limb of his claim.)

Financial Services Regulations

The Judge in R (Clydesdale Financial Services Ltd) v Financial Ombudsman Service Ltd [2024] EWHC 3237 (Admin) quotes a decision of the Financial Ombudsman:

The discretionary commission model Barclays PF used in Miss L's case, created an inherent conflict between the interests of the Broker and the interests of Miss L, as it gave the Broker an incentive to set a higher interest rate than Barclays PF would have accepted so that the Broker could receive more commission.

In introducing and operating the discretionary commission arrangement with the Broker on the terms it did, Barclays PF acted contrary to the guidance at CONC 4.5.2G and failed to have due regard to Miss L's interests and treat her fairly as required by Principle 6 of the Financial Conduct Authority's ("FCA") Principles for Businesses (the "Principles").

This expresses the lender’s conduct in terms of a breach of investment Principles and ‘Guidance’ (denoted by ‘G’). The regulator is able to impose sanctions on regulated firms for breach of Principles and Guidance. In order to bring a claim under s138D of FSMA, a consumer needs to show a breach of a ‘rule’ (denoted by ‘R’) in the Handbook. 

In the FCA’s published findings in its investigation of the motor finance sector (published in March 2019), the FCA found that the way in which commission arrangements operate might be leading to consumer harm on a potentially significant scale (see the FCA Review Findings, Executive Summary, p.4).

In the paragraphs below, we pick through the various ways in which the lenders’ conduct in a paradigm motor finance case offends against the regulatory framework in which they were supposed to operate.

PRIN requires lenders and their agents to adhere to eleven principles of business (the ‘Principles’) in their dealings with consumers. By secretly operating a discretionary commission model, to a consumer’s detriment, a lender will be taken knowingly to have incentivised the dealership to act against consumers’ best interests. It will therefore have breached the Principles in at least the following ways. 

It will have:

1. failed to act with integrity in accordance with Principle 1;
2. failed to observe proper standards or market conduct in accordance with Principle 5;
3. failed to pay due regard to the interest of customers and treat them fairly in accordance with Principle 6;
4. failed to pay due regard for the information needs of customers and to ensure that any information was communicated to them in a way that is clear, fair and not misleading in accordance with Principle 7;
5. failed to manage the conflict of interest between it and its customers fairly in accordance with Principle 8; and
6. failed to take reasonable care to ensure the suitability of its advice and discretionary decisions to any customers who are entitled to rely upon its judgment in accordance with Principle 9. 

The relevant Rules are:

• CONC 1.2.2R. By virtue of this rule, a lender was required to ensure that its agents complied with CONC and to take reasonable steps to ensure such compliance by others acting on its behalf. On the basis, therefore, that a) the dealer in fixing the interest rate (where there was a discretionary commission arrangement) was acting on the lender’s behalf and was its agent, and b) the dealership’s non-disclosure of the commission arrangements was a breach of CONC, the lender was also in breach, having failed take to take reasonable steps to ensure the necessary disclosure.
• CONC 2.5.3R - A firm must … explain the key features of a regulated credit agreement to enable the customer to make an informed choice as required by CONC 4.2.5[R].
• CONC 3.3.1R - A firm must ensure that a communication or a financial promotion is clear, fair, and not misleading.
  …
  (1A) A firm must ensure that each communication … (e) does not disguise, omit, diminish or obscure important information
• CONC 3.7.3R - A firm must, in a financial promotion or a document which is intended for individuals which relates to its credit broking, indicate the extent of its powers and in particular whether it works exclusively with one or more lenders or works independently.
  (A failure to disclose discretionary commission arrangements in any documents provided by the dealers to customers about their credit-brokering is an obvious breach of this duty.)
• CONC 4.2.5R  - (1) Before making a regulated credit agreement the firm must … (a) provide the customer with an adequate explanation of … (2)(c) the features of the agreement which may operate in a manner which would have a significant adverse effect on the customer in a way which the customer is unlikely to foresee.
  (The key feature of the relevant agreements, being the rate of interest charged, which in the case of a discretionary commission arrangement was the product of the perverse incentive created by the agreement between lender and dealership, operated in a way that was adverse to the interests of clients.)
• CONC 4.5.3R required that a credit-broker must disclose the existence of commission, where it might affect their impartiality or have a material impact on the customer’s transactional decision.
  This was breached in our view by dealerships, since the commission is secret (it is inconceivable that salespeople might have explained to customers that although the lender was prepared to accept a lower rate of interest, they were proposing a higher one so that they could be paid more).
• CONC 4.5.3AR - In circumstances where the credit broker is required to disclose the existence and nature of any commission, fee or other remuneration under CONC 4.5.3R, it must also disclose to the customer, at the same time and with equal prominence, how the existence and nature of this commission, fee or other remuneration may affect the amounts payable by the customer under the relevant credit agreement or consumer hire agreement.
  This, again, was in our view clearly breached in arrangements involving a discretionary commission.
• CONC 4.5.4R required the lender to disclose to customers, in good time before a regulated credit agreement or a regulated consumer hire agreement was entered into, the amount (or if the precise amount was not known, the likely amount) of any commission or fee or other remuneration payable to the credit broker by the lender or owner or a third party.

Breaches of rules set out in CONC give rise (subject to the limited exceptions listed in Schedule 50) to claims for statutory duty pursuant to section 138D of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000.
In addition, all of the relevant senior staff who from time to time had managerial responsibility for motor finance were arguably personally in breach of COCON 2.2.3[R]:

SC3: You must take reasonable steps to ensure that any delegation of your responsibilities is to an appropriate person and that you oversee the discharge of the delegated responsibility effectively.

In circumstances in which neither the dealership nor the lender has disclosed the fact of the discretionary commission arrangements, client’s claims under s138D seem to us to be very strong – and this is likely to be the legal justification for the redress scheme.

Unfair relationship claims under the Consumer Credit Act

S.140A sets out what factors a court might consider when seeking to determine whether the relationship between the creditor and the debtor is fair, in relation to a credit agreement:

• any of the terms of the agreement or of any related agreement;
• the way in which the creditor has exercised or enforced any of his rights under the agreement or any related agreement; and
• any other thing done (or not done) by, or on behalf of, the creditor (either before or after the making of the agreement or any related agreement). 

Under section 140B the court can require: 

• the creditor to repay (in whole or in part) any sum paid by the debtor;
• the creditor to take certain action, cease certain action or prohibit certain action in connection with the agreement;
• reduce or discharge any sum payable by the debtor by virtue of the agreement;
• the return of any property provided by way of security;
• set aside (in whole or in part) any duty imposed on the debtor or on a surety by virtue of the agreement;
• alter the terms of the agreement; or
• direct accounts to be taken, or (in Scotland) an accounting to be made, between any persons.

Guidance illustrating how the court will interpret section 140A was provided in the Supreme Court decision in Plevin v Paragon Personal Finance Limited [2014] UKSC 61 WLR 4222. The key to the unfairness in that case was the degree of inequality of knowledge between the creditor and debtor. Considerations listed in Plevin as being relevant to the fairness in the relationship include: ‘the characteristics of the borrower, her sophistication or vulnerability, the facts which she could reasonably be expected to know or assume, the range of choices available to her, and the degree to which the creditor was or should have been aware of these matters’.  

Here, in DCA cases, the factors which confirm that the relationship was unfair are:

• clients’ lack of knowledge of the scale of the commission paid;
• the fact that the dealership had a discretion to set the interest rate, which was influenced by a conflict of interest, in that it was motivated to increase the interest rate charged in order to increase its own commission, and that neither the relationship between the dealer’s rate of commission and the rate of interest under the finance agreement nor the dealer’s power to fix the interest rate were disclosed;

In the Johnson case, the factors that pointed to unfairness included the type of commission, the size of the commission and the tied commercial relationship between dealership and lender. These factors may apply to cases that did not involve a DCA, but which involved a lending arrangement which was arguable otherwise unfair.

The ‘things done or not done’ for the purpose of proving the jurisdictional requirement in respect of causation under s.140A(1)(c) were the non-disclosure by the lender or that by the dealer, on the basis that, in fixing the interest rate, the dealer was acting on behalf of the lender.

If you need assistance, our team is here to help. Contact us via info@motorfinance.harcusparker.co.uk and one of our team will be in touch.

Still wondering whether it is worth pursuing your car finance claim with us? Here are ten reasons to take action:

You are not alone 

• Millions were affected

The practice of charging discretionary commissions and other relevant commission was unfair and contrary to consumer law, and it made your motor finance more expensive than it should have been.

• DCAs were misleading and banned by the FCA

Certainty 

• Although the terms on which the FCA is consulting include a requirement that lenders should contact and try to trace their customers, there is no certainty that your lender will locate you, particularly if you have moved or changed your name or your agreement concluded more than six years ago and records have been destroyed. The proposed scheme rules also require you to respond; and if no contact is made, you will receive nothing unless either you, either directly or through a representative, contact your lender with your relevant details. On the present proposals, if no contact is made within 12 months of the start of the scheme, you will lose your chance to claim.

Speed 

• The FCA has stated that if consumers have complained before the commencement of the redress scheme, they are likely to receive redress sooner.

Less hassle

• You do not need your old paperwork. We manage the entire process for you, using technology to progress your claim efficiently, from identifying your claims and submitting them to the defendants, to making all necessary representations, to distributing compensation if you are entitled to it.

Verification and accountability

• The proposed calculation methodology is complex. We can check the defendants’ calculations and require the defendants to disclose the information on which they are based to ensure that you receive the correct amount of redress.
• If the FCA’s proposals are implemented, the redress scheme will essentially be ‘lender-led.’ You may not trust lenders, who acted against your interests in the first place who would be in charge of leading the proposed scheme, to do the right thing now.
• This is your chance to push for fairness and reform in this case and in future.

Legal Expertise

• We have in-depth knowledge of the laws and regulations surrounding motor finance claims.

Potentially stronger claims and alternative claims

• If a lender denies wrongdoing, claims not to have information or does not offer what we estimate to be the correct amount of compensation, we can challenge their decision. Note that we are not saying that we will achieve a better result through the redress scheme than the redress scheme rules dictate. We can, however, hold the defendants to its terms.

Issues we may be able to assist with include:

• the FCA’s consultation suggests that it will be possible for some consumers to object to the proposed rate of compensatory interest, which is just 1% over the Bank of England base rate. Consumers who will be able to argue for a higher rate are those who can claim that they had to borrow money at a higher cost as a result of not having money available that they should have had. We can help with the presentation of relevant evidence;
   
• irresponsible lending: if it appears that, because of your personal circumstances, you should never have been offered the lending in the first place then, outside of the redress scheme, we may be able to bring a different and more valuable claim on your behalf;
   
• the method of calculating interest: we can check whether the interest was calculated correctly in accordance with your contract. If it was not, it may be possible raise additional issues outside the scheme;
   
• when we request disclosure from the defendants, we can also ask for disclosure of commissions within any insurances or products you financed, including GAP insurance, paint insurance and alloy wheel insurance; and
   
• some clients may have paid commissions at a level which makes it worth their while to seek compensation through the courts instead of accepting a redress payment that is lower than a court would award – we can advise on this and act in appropriate cases in which it is in the client’s interest to opt out of the redress scheme and accept the inevitably longer and riskier process of litigation.
   

It Is A Risk-Free Service

• No upfront costs. Most clients will pay between 28-30% (plus VAT) of their compensation to Harcus Parker, unless in your case we agree that the litigation route is advisable. For a full explanation of our fees, click here. Note that it is possible to claim yourself without charge, and you could be compensated if you do nothing.

Multiple Claims

• We can handle all your claims for you, even if you borrowed from multiple lenders, and even if some of your agreements date back to as long ago as 2007, we could find evidence for you to substantiate a claim.

A Stress-Free Service

• Dealing with bank correspondence and legalese can be daunting. Our experienced team and technology can handle it all for you. Even though the FCA is attempting to create as simple and straightforward a scheme as possible, and has said it will require lenders to write to affected consumers within 6 months of the introduction of a redress scheme (or 3 months if you have already complained), you will still have to engage with the scheme itself and communicate decisions about issues including whether you wish to ‘opt-in’ and make a complaint if your lender contacts you, or whether you wish to ‘opt-out’ if you have already made a complaint. 

The FCA accepts (as we believe is inevitable) that not everyone will receive correspondence from their lender and has encouraged consumers to make complaints if they can before any redress scheme begins. It has pointed out that in order to make a claim yourself without charge you will need to track down your lender and see if you can find a copy of your finance agreements. In an advertisement issued before the consultation document, the FCA has suggested that you could try checking old bank statements, as the lender should be named there; you can ask the dealer from which your purchased the vehicle for details; or, if the agreement was within the last 6 years, you can check your own credit file. The FCA points out that the Information Commissioner’s Office (‘ICO’)  has information on how to obtain one's credit file here. The ICO gives guidance as to how to make a Data Subject Access Request (‘DSAR’), and also notes that most of the credit checking agencies have a facility for people to access their own file without making a formal DSAR. 

Or we can help.

Yes — it is important for us to stress that if you do nothing you may be contacted by your lender (as the FCA’s consultation suggests should happen within six months of the launch of the redress scheme), or you can proactively make a car finance claim yourself by using free template letters available from trusted sites like Resolver and MoneySavingExpert or by following the advice of the FCA by using its template letter and applying to your lender, perhaps having first checked to see if you can find a copy of your finance agreements, looked through old bank statements, asked the dealer from which your purchased the vehicle for details, or, if the agreement was within the last 6 years, you checked your own credit file. 

But whilst it is possible to go it alone, mis-sold car finance claims could (despite the FCA’s best efforts) become complex if:

• you have had multiple car finance agreements;
• your lender cannot trace you;
• you no longer have access to your finance paperwork;
• the lender refuses to disclose full commission details, so that you are unable to verify the amount you are owed, or denies the claim; or
• you may not trust lenders, who acted against your interests in the first place and are in charge of leading the proposed scheme, to do the right thing now.

Choosing a legal firm like Harcus Parker means you are backed by a team of financial claims experts with experience in handling complex claims. We manage the whole process — from verifying your eligibility to challenging lenders and putting forward what arguments we can in relation to the interest rate that should be applied — so you do not have to.

With us, claiming is hassle-free, comes with without an upfront fee (noting that you may receive compensation in any event and can act for yourself for free, and you could be compensated if you do nothing) and is designed to get you the maximum refund you are owed.

You can find out more about the FCA’s proposed redress scheme here.

• Student fee claims – for those whose university experience was disrupted by Covid-19 or strikes. Join the claim
• Equal pay claims – for current or former Tesco, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, or Asda store employees who may have been underpaid compared to warehouse and distribution centre staff. Join the claim
• Mortgage prisoner claims – for former Northern Rock customers who overpaid due to unfair mortgage interest rates. Join the claim