Discretionary Commission Arrangement and the FCA

Financial Chat
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FCA Automotive

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Just had a letter from Blackhorse confirming they’ve (finally) looked into my request and have confirmed there was a discretionary commission arrangement.

In terms of next steps they’re saying the complaint has been logged and they will be in touch me with AFTER 24th September 2024 with their response to my complaint.

The wait continues.

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First of all, thank you for this thread, without which I may not have known about this in time.

I have been looking back through my emails, cloud documents and finally paper documents for all my previous vehicle finance agreements, some of which have been hard to find (the days before having everything emailed and/or backed up). I had more than I thought
!

I got the first reply back from Honda Finance Europe, just 2-3 days after submitting my email template, to say my agreement may have included a DCA. I am also waiting for a separate Honda one (unless they included both my emails in one response), and a couple of Blackhorse ones.

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I’ve had template replies from Barclays and Alphera both confirming DCA was in place. Now I guess it’s a waiting game.

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I’ve had recent responses from

  • PSA finance - 2 finance agreements - both had no DCA
  • Blackhorse - 2 finance agreements - only acknowledgements of the filings, no commitment either way for either agreement. 28 day response period reactivated
  • Close Brothers - 1 finance agreement - confirmed DCA was included

The extension caused by the FCA agreeing to investigate further historical agreements has allowed the involved finance companies to pause until September, with up to 8 weeks after September (December?) to present the results. Wait, wait, wait


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If they do pay out, my understanding is you’ll also be paid out statutory interest right, that’s obviously not been confirmed what it will be.

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And inflation?
I read Blackhorse has earmarked £450 million for DCA costs


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So update, just came home to find a letter from Blackhorse confirming that I had a DCA on my agreement. Pretty much nothing is going to happen until the FCA complete their work though.

So, updated list:

Mercedes x2: Generic acknowledgment email, no response to case.
Blackhorse: DCA confirmed.
PSA (Stellantis): Confirmed no DCA.

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For me, Honda has emailed me to say there “may” have been DCA in place, and I keep getting the same email from Blackhorse every 28 days saying they’re looking into it.

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I received a letter from Blackhorse confirming that the three agreements I enquired about involved DCA, and they are turning it into a complaint.

And this is where the good news end, for now, as the FCA has now said they will extend the deadline for a decision on how to deal with this to December 2025😮

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Then there’s 8 weeks after decision-deadline, making it Feb-25 before any progress (or not!)

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I think that’s the problem with this and why I’ve not even bothered to check. Personally I don’t see it’s worth it spending all that time trying to work out if I had it or not/give me details to a company to do this just for the originating finance company to stall, erode, flight back for years on end.

Good luck to those that persist but “I’m out”

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You’ve got to be in it for the lawyers to win it.

I’ve spent very little time on this tbh. Had 5 claims in, 3 were instantly rejected (justified with evidence) and 2 are ongoing. While these 2 have been dragged out, there’s interest, interest, interest. Which will be quickly gobbled up by the ambulance-chasers. But if I get £50 for a bit of effort which is legally correct (sadly not morally correct) I’ll take it.

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And that’s totally fair. For me it’s not worth it but each to their own of course.

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I only spent less than an hour searching through emails and document scans in my files to find the relevant agreement numbers.
Then I just used MoneySavingExpert’s online form to create an email.

The FCA has postponed decisions to Dec 25, so that takes us into 2026 actually.

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Whoops - optimistic typo!

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Which is why I started the bit you quoted with Personally :wink:

Good luck with it and hope you and others who do this get their money back.

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This :point_up:

It took me 2 minutes to log into my online account to get the details of my car finance.

Then paste these into the templated email from moneysaving expert and you’re done. They even give you the exact email address to send to, that in my cases are specifically setup to deal with these types of enquiries.

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Update from me I have 2 queries with BMW Finance and they just came back on both. 1 had a DCA and one didn’t

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Coincidentally (is that the right word) when this whole investigation started my lender actually reached out ‘assuring’ me they didn’t partake in these types of deals.

Maybe I shall send an email to them anyway and see what the response is.

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