More than 8,600 Halifax and Bank of Scotland customers will be entitled to a share of £17m compensation for poor complaints handling

.
The Financial Services Authority (FSA) fined the bank £3.5m following an investigation that showed the central office had mishandled complaints about retail investment products, many of which were filed by elderly customers with poor understanding of the complicated investment process.
In the 15 months to October 31, 2009 Bank of Scotland received more than 2,500 complaints about the potential misspelling of four investment products, and wrongfully dismissed a significant number of these complaints.
The FSA investigation found that Bank of Scotland complaint handlers failed to assess complaints competently and did not take into consideration all relevant customer information.
The bank was also found to have failed to analyse both its own complaints data and complaints made to the Financial Services Ombudsman in order to recognise trends or growing issues.