The Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) has confirmed a package of reforms designed to modernise how complaints are handled. The reforms focus on: Introducing a new registration stage before investigation. Clarifying and expanding dismissal powers. Updating the “fair and reasonable” test used in complaint decisions. 1. New Registration Stage The Financial
Customers judge brands on how they fix problems, not just how they sell. There was a time when customer experience was largely defined by moments of delight, seamless onboarding and personalised recommendations. Brands invested heavily in creating memorable experiences designed to win customers over. Today, the moments that matter most
For years, UK general insurers have focused on reducing indemnity spend as the primary lever for claims profitability. In 2026, that assumption is being challenged. Increasingly, the true cost of claims is not the payout itself, but the operational friction that surrounds it. Hidden claims leakage is occurring across the value chain.
Many organisations still view complaint management primarily as a regulatory requirement. A necessary control designed to reduce risk, satisfy regulators and resolve issues once something has gone wrong. That perspective is becoming increasingly outdated. Having worked with complaint operations across multiple sectors, one thing has become clear: the organisations extracting
Complaints are often treated as an operational burden. They arrive late in a customer journey, demand time and resource, and carry regulatory and reputational risk. So organisations do what they are designed to do: they process them efficiently, bring them to closure, and move on. But in doing so, most
Complaints are still widely viewed as an unavoidable cost of doing business. They sit in operational teams, measured by backlog, handling time and regulatory compliance. Success is often defined as closing cases rather than changing outcomes. We see that this mindset is increasingly out of step with reality. Every complaint
The Challenge: Operating in a fast paced environment with high scrutiny, the firm needed a partner that could embed a customer centric approach, deliver robust governance and quality assurance, and scale quickly without disrupting day to day operations. Ensuring consistent decision making, low complaint volumes and strong regulatory outcomes was
The Challenge: A leading UK building society needed a comprehensive outcomes testing framework covering core products—investments, protection, mortgages, and retail banking—to ensure compliance and deliver consistent, customer-focused results. Our Solution: Benchmarked outcomes – Huntswood began by conducting a thorough ‘current state’ review across the building society’s operations. This included detailed
Paraplanning is still viewed, in some quarters, as a process that allows advisers to pass administrative burden to someone else. And on occasion, that can be true. But when paraplanning is reduced to little more than an offloading exercise, the real value of the role is not just missed, it
A people-first culture across the globe Across the world, conversations about work are shifting. Organisations are paying closer attention to how culture shapes performance, how wellbeing influences long term resilience and how purpose helps people stay connected to their work. At Huntswood, these themes have become central to how we
