For free support, you can contact your GP or NHS 111 (press 2 for the urgent mental health line in England), or find local NHS Talking Therapies services via the NHS website.

Stage 1 - Investigator: The first stage is that your case is considered by an investigator. They will review the case and will put forward what they believe is the most reasonable resolution to your complaint. Most cases are resolved at this stage. The opinion of an Investigator is not binding, so either party can appeal if they are not happy with the outcome.

Stage 2 - Ombudsman: If either party is unhappy with the outcome reached by the Investigator and appeals, the case will then be reviewed by an Ombudsman, who is a more senior member of staff. Their decision is final, so there is no appeal after this. Once they issue their decision, the case is closed and this is the end of the process. If you accept a final decision from an Ombudsman, it is legally binding on you and the bank.

Outcomes from Investigators (Stage 1)

Partial Upholds from Investigators:

After the investigator has reviewed the case, they will provide us with their opinion. This will outline their investigation and ultimately their findings of what they think the outcome of the complaint should be. 

In some cases, the refund amount is a percentage of the total amount lost. This is called a “Partial Uphold”. When you receive a partial uphold outcome, it means that the investigator agrees that the bank could have done more, and so has upheld your case, but for a variety of reasons, not all the transactions will be considered or fully refunded. 

We will put this offer to you, usually with advice on if we think that the view is fair and in line with other outcomes we have been seeing in similar cases to yours. The bank you have complained about will also be sent the Investigator’s opinion to consider. 

Both you and the bank will have the opportunity to appeal or to accept this view. Both you and the bank have to accept in order for the case to be closed and the refund paid to you. 

Asking the Investigator to reconsider:

In some cases, we may disagree with certain aspects of the view, and we may advise you that we can provide the investigator with more information and ask them to reconsider their outcome. 

We would reply to the investigator and explain why we do not agree with their findings, and offer some more points and arguments for them to consider. Sometimes, this will be going into more detail about a vulnerability that we feel has not been properly considered, or arguing that the regulation has not been applied in the way we would expect it to have been. 

The investigator will then have time to consider the points we have raised, to see if their view on the case, and therefore the outcome, should change. This can add another few weeks or sometimes months to the case depending on how far it is taken. 

It is rare that at this stage an investigator would reconsider their view, but in some cases we believe that it is worth doing this before taking the case to a full appeal. 

If the investigator does not agree with the arguments we have made at this point, and you still do not want to accept the previous view, we will request a ‘Final Decision’ from the Ombudsman. 

Appealing to an Ombudsman (Stage 2):

When we ask for a Final Decision (an Ombudsman review) your case will again be put in a queue to be allocated. This can be a few weeks to a few months - depending on how many cases are being appealed, but we often see them take up to 6 months. At the moment, we are seeing more cases being appealed by the banks, so we anticipate that the wait will more likely be months. 

Once your case is being investigated by an Ombudsman, the previous offer is taken off the table and a completely new investigation is conducted. Therefore, if your case is taken to appeal, it means that you could have the same, a better or worse outcome. We will always inform you of what we think your chances are and whether we think the initial outcome was fair.

When we receive the Final Decision from the Ombudsman, we will again contact you to let you know the outcome of their investigation. You will be asked if you would like to accept or decline the outcome. 

If you accept, this becomes legally binding on the bank and they have to refund the amount suggested by the Ombudsman in their Final Decision. 

The Final Decision is anonymised as these are published on their website, so your identity will never be revealed. 

Ombudsman Provisional Decisions:

Occasionally, rather than sending you a Final, binding Decision, the Ombudsman will send a Provisional Decision - This is essentially the Ombudsman telling us what they believe their Final Decision will be and is a final call for commentary. They often do this when they are reaching a different view from the Investigator. This is sent to both Refundee and the bank. Whilst we can add further arguments, it is extremely unlikely that this would change the Ombudsman's view.

This is a simple interest that is calculated annually at 8%. Depending on your circumstances, this is either from the date that you made the payment until they pay you your refund, or the date that the bank initially refused to refund you up until they pay you your refund. 

This means that when we notify you that your case has been successful, we are not able to calculate the exact amount that the interest will be, as it will continue accruing until the bank arranges the refund to be paid you. Each day that goes by will accrue a little bit more interest.

Sometimes that interest is added across all money recovered, but in other instances it is only added to some of your refund, as it depends on how you funded your payments. 

If you are awarded interest, the bank will also consider any tax implications. Therefore, they may deduct taxes before making repayments to you. The bank should write to you with a breakdown of the exact figures. If they do not, you can request this from them.

It is important to note that the 8% interest has since been reduced by the Financial Ombudsman service for any cases that are referred after January the 1st 2026. The new interest rate that will be applied is the Bank of Englands base rate of 1%. This will affect any new cases that are referred to the Financial Ombudsman service after January the 1st 2026

An example of how the 8% interest is applied

This is an example of how the 8% would be calculated on a refund amount of $1,000, if the fraud payment was made 6 months before the bank refunded.

$1,000 x 0.08 = $80 interest (this would be the 8% annual interest total)

$80 ÷ 2 = $40 interest (this would be the final interest amount, as it would be 6 months interest)

To do the calculation, you can use the following guide

Refund award x 0.08 (8%) = Total interest for one year

Total interest for one year ÷ 365 days = Total interest for one day 

Total interest for one day X amount of days from the transaction until the refund date = Total interest awarded. 

Interest amount awards can differ 

If you have lost money from your account, but the money was originally in a savings account or you had taken out a loan to fund the payments, the interest amount will not be 8%. 

If you have used money from a savings account, it is likely that the interest you will be awarded will be the same as the savings account rate rather than 8%. Therefore, if your savings account interest rate is 1%, this is also the interest rate you would be awarded with your refund. 

If you have taken out a loan to fund the payments, it is likely that the interest awarded will be the same rate as the loan interest. This is because the bank should help you get back to the same situation as you were in before the money was lost. 

Interest is not always awarded

In some cases, the bank or the FOS do not offer any interest on payments. This will happen if you borrowed the money off family or friends to fund the payments during the scam. 

Unfortunately, if you borrowed the money from friends or family, you will not be entitled to any interest additionally to the refund. This is because the bank/ FOS are putting you back into a position that you would have been in had you not lost the money. Had you not been involved in a scam, the funds would not have been in your possession and you would not have accrued any interest on the money. 

You can request not to have interest awarded in your claim

If for any reason you would like to request that additional interest is not considered in your case, please let us know. 

We can adjust our contracts to reflect this, and as all our complaints are bespoke, we can request that they do not add the 8% interest to the settlement of your claim.

Update on interest awards for new claims

It is important to note that the 8% interest has since been reduced by the Financial Ombudsman service for any cases that are referred after January the 1st 2026. The new interest rate that will be applied is the Bank of Englands base rate of 1%. This will affect any new cases that are referred to the Financial Ombudsman service after January the 1st 2026.