By Wayne Lee
The Financial Ombudsman Service has one of the worst employee rating on Glassdoor, behind William Hill, Berrit, and J.D sports, all of which were awarded one of the worst 10 ratings given by employees. In the latest employee rating, the Ombudsman came bottom among some of the lowest rated organisations rated by Glassdoor, with 1.9 stars out of 5. It was beaten by J.D sport which had 2.6 out of 5, Mitie, 2.3 out of 5, Holland and Berret, 2.3 out of 5, and William Hill , 2.5/5.
The regulator, set up by Parliament to resolve disputes between financial businesses and their customers, claim to operate a service that is ”fair for everyone”. Whilst the regulator has testimonials about the ‘effective’ service they provide, they unsurprisingly do not post comments that air dissatisfaction about their service. Bad promotion will do their service no good.
However, employees have complained of “challenging” and “stressful” conditions, in which “we simply don’t have enough time to do what’s asked of us”. What is asked of employees will to a large degree involve logging full details of complaints, going through the details, and appointing someone to assess the claim without bias effectively. Under stressful and challenging conditions, it is doubtful this can be done to the required level. An effective service requires good conditions that enable workers to deliver their best, not stressful conditions. Employees praised the dispute resolution service for its “good benefits” and “flexible working hours”, but flexible working hours do not necessarily amount to good service.
News of the rating was brought to the attention of the eye of media.com by a reader who wanted to know of there was any relationship between the Ombudsman for Vodaphone and the financial ombudsman. The eye of media.com revealed a few months ago how the Ombudsman for Vodaphone were found to be appalling in their service to customers after one of our members was dealt with in an extremely unprofessional manner that led to an article exposing them. This month, the eye of media.com will be submitting a full dossier to the government, calling for the abolishing of the incompetent Ombudsman for Vodaphone, a copy of which ofcom have already asked to be supplied with.
A spokesperson for the Financial Ombudsman said: “Over the last few years, we’ve been changing the way our organisation works so that we can provide a better and more efficient service to our customers – with ombudsmen on the phone sorting out complaints in days rather than taking months.
“Of course, this has been a major shift for our own people and how they work, and although the overwhelming majority recognize the need for us to change that doesn’t mean it’s easy.”