28Nov
From The BBC:
Mobile phone company Vodafone plans to close its final salary pension scheme to 4,000 current members.It is one of the biggest employers to have taken take this step recently, which it says is necessary to rein in the rising cost of the scheme. Staff have been sent letters about the plan as part of the legally required consultation process. The final salary scheme was closed to new joiners in 2005, with 6,000 staff now in a defined contribution scheme. “Defined benefit [final salary] schemes have become significantly more expensive to operate with their costs likely to rise in the future,” said a spokesman. “This change will make our pension provision sustainable in the long term, and affordable for employees and the company.” Wider trendThe employees in Vodafone’s final salary plan will join the defined contribution (DC) scheme instead, which the company says will be “substantially improved.” The company is proposing to raise the level of its contributions to the DC scheme from one-an…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
Travellers who book holidays on the internet could receive more financial protection if things go wrong, under plans in a European review.Consumers who make up their own packages of flights, hotels and car rentals on one website or partner sites could get more protection. Currently, only those who have booked specific package deals have rights to cancel or refunds if operators go bust. A review will consider help for passengers if airlines collapse. “We need tough protection that gives all consumers booking a package holiday the peace of mind they deserve, and we need a level playing field so businesses compete on equal terms,” said EU Consumer Commissioner Meglena Kuneva. The consumers’ association Which? welcomed the review. “The Package Travel Directive was drawn up almost 20 years ago, and while useful at the time, it doesn’t go far enough to protect today’s holidaymaker,” said Rochelle Turner, of Which? Holiday. “A significant number of people book hotels from a direct link on an…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
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Regina Finn of Ofwat: ”Customers are reaping the benefits of what they have paid in the past”
Average water bills in England and Wales will be reduced slightly over the next five years, regulator Ofwat has announced.It has ruled that typical bills will fall by £3 to £340 by 2015, before the impact of inflation is considered. Publishing its final decisions on what firms can charge from 2010 to 2015, Ofwat said bills would be 10% lower than the level companies had asked for. The water companies said funding greater investment would be difficult. “It is quite possible that companies will have to adjust or stop their leakage programmes,” said Pamela Taylor, the chief executive of the industry body Water UK. “They will need to make sure they can fulfil their legal obligations. They’ve got challenges ahead such as climate change, with increased drought and flooding, [and] a growing population with more homes.”
Pro…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
Many more pension schemes will close in the next five years, to both new and existing members, a report has said.Just 23% of final-salary pension schemes in the private sector are still open to new joiners, the National Association of Pension Funds also said. A year ago the figure stood at 28% but since then more schemes have closed, both to new members and existing ones. The NAPF said the drop in the number of schemes that were still open was greater than in the previous two years. Increasing trendThe annual survey found that 62% of pension schemes that were still open to new joiners expected to let their current members continue to build up more pension over the next five years. But 18% expected to move both their new and existing members into defined contribution (DC) schemes.
Even more change is in store for schemes already shut to new joiners. Of these, 31% expect they will switch all their active members to a DC scheme for the future accrual of pension. Last month, an annual sur…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) has given extra time for people to confess to dodging tax through offshore accounts.The deadline of its current disclosure campaign has been extended from Monday 30 November to Monday 4 January 2010. That is the date by which UK taxpayers who have failed to pay tax on their offshore savings or investments must indicate they will pay up. The Revenue said the decision was taken to give banks extra time to contact their customers with offshore accounts. “We know that some bank customers will not be contacted by their banks in good time for the original deadline of 30 November so in the interests of fairness we have decided to extend our deadline by a month to 4 January,” said Dave Hartnett, HMRC’s permanent secretary for tax. “The new disclosure opportunity (NDO) is voluntary but from the start of the New Year we will begin to investigate those who were eligible to use the NDO but instead buried their heads in the sand.” Paying upPayment of any unpaid tax m…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
House prices in England and Wales continued rising in October, climbing by 0.6% according to the latest survey from the Land Registry.It was the fifth month in a row that prices had risen, the Land Registry said. That put the average house price at £159,546, although that was still 3.4% lower than a year ago. The biggest monthly rise was 1.9% in north-west England, while the biggest fall was 2.3% in Wales. “There remains a wide variation in the strength of the pricing recovery between the regions, said Oliver Gilmartin, economist at the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. “Average house prices in London grew at over £4,000 during October whilst Wales witnessed price falls of over £2,000,” he added. “House prices are set to rise further in the coming months supported by an ongoing shortage of property listings relative to demand.” The consultancy Capital Economics predicted that the rise in prices of the past few months would soon run out of steam. “The shortage…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
Lloyds Banking Group has said it will ask local courts to dismiss thousands of overdraft cases lodged against it for the return of overdraft fees.The claims have been on hold since July 2007 when a group of banks and the Office of Fair Trading started a test case over the fairness of bank charges. The Supreme Court ruled this week that the OFT could not decide the charges were unfair under consumer legislation. Lloyds Banking Group includes both Lloyds TSB and HBOS banks. “As the judgement concludes the test case, the FSA [Financial Services Authority] has agreed that these complaints should no longer remain on hold,” said a statement on the websites of both Lloyds TSB and HBOS. “This means that for those customers who currently have an outstanding complaint about unarranged overdrafts, we’ll be writing to them shortly to let them know what today’s judgment means for them. “We be asking the County and Sheriff Courts to apply the Supreme Court judgement to dismiss any claims they curren…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
A card payment service commonly used by customers to avoid high transaction charges when booking flights is being phased out by two major providers.Customers who pay by Visa Electron are not charged transaction fees by airlines such as Ryanair, Aer Lingus, BMIbaby, Easyjet and Flybe. Abbey and Travelex have told BBC Radio 4′s Money Box their cards will not feature Visa Electron by next year. But another banking group, HBOS said it would continue to offer the card. High chargesSeveral airlines now charge a flat fee transaction charge per person, per flight, when customers pay by debit or credit card.
It can add up to a substantial part of the overall cost. Ryanair charges £5 per person, per flight, even if all the passengers are paid for on the one card, in a single transaction. Vic, from Hertfordshire, contacted Radio 4′s Money Box to complain after Ryanair charged him £20 to pay by credit card. He was buying return flights to Italy for himself and his wife: “I paid £…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
Five of the big six energy suppliers still overcharge customers using pre-pay meters, despite new Ofgem rules, the National Housing Federation says.The watchdog capped how much more pre-pay customers can be charged than those paying by direct debit, in September. The NHF says Scottish Power, British Gas, Npower, Scottish & Southern and E.On all failed to meet the cap. Energy retailers denied breaching the rules. Ofgem said it would investigate any objective evidence of overcharging. It says its new rules had already cut energy bills by £96m. ‘Absolute disgrace’Ofgem imposed a cap of £88 on how much more per year gas and electricity companies could charge the UK’s six million pre-pay customers over those who pay via direct debit. This followed a major investigation last year, in which the regulator found that “service costs for pre-payment meter customers are £88 per customer higher than for a direct debit customer”. But the NHF, which represents 1,200 housing asso…
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28Nov
From The BBC:
There is a lack of consistency in the way insurance companies treat flood victims who are looking to make claims, the National Flood Forum has said.The charity says the problem of people living on the same street being charged very different excesses for flood insurance is of “epidemic proportions”. It adds that people who have claimed for flood damage in the past often find it difficult to get a better deal. Insurers say it is normal for offers to vary for different customers. Same property, different storiesDominic Witherow and Mike Lewin live next door to each other in Chobham, Surrey, in a property which has been split into two homes. Mr Witherow, who moved into the property after previous flooding and has never made a claim, has a flood excess of £100. Mr Lewin, who is with a different insurer and has claimed for past flooding, is looking at an excess of £10,000.
Both men believe this is unfair. “Mike’s building and my building are the same,” says Mr Witherow. “We are…
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