Mitsubishi HC Capital UK Plc · DRN-6265417

The complaint Mrs G’s complaint is, in essence, that Mitsubishi HC Capital UK Plc trading as Hitachi Capital (the ‘Lender’) acted unfairly and unreasonably by (1) being party to an unfair credit relationship with them under Section 140A of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 (as amended) (the ‘CCA’) and (2) deciding against paying claims under Section 75 of the CCA. The timeshare in question was bought in the joint names of Mr and Mrs G. But as Mrs G paid for it with finance in her sole name, she is the only eligible complainant here. I will, however, referred to both Mr and Mrs G where it is appropriate for me to do so. What happened Mr and Mrs G were members of a timeshare provider (the ‘Supplier’) – having purchased a number of products from it over time. But the product at the centre of this complaint is their membership of a timeshare that I’ll call the ‘Fractional Club’ – which they bought on 5 February 2015 (the ‘Time of Sale’). They entered into an agreement with the Supplier to buy 10,000 fractional points at a cost of £12,200 (the ‘Purchase Agreement’). Fractional Club membership was asset backed – which meant it gave Mr and Mrs G more than just holiday rights. It also included a share in the net sale proceeds of a property named on the Purchase Agreement (the ‘Allocated Property’) after their membership term ends. Mrs G paid for their Fractional Club membership by taking finance of £12,200 from the Lender (the ‘Credit Agreement’) in her sole name. On 6 April 2017 Mr and Mrs G voluntarily surrendered their fractional points, and consequently their rights to any proceeds from the future sale of the Allocated Property, as their deterioration in health meant their ability to take holidays was now limited. Mrs G – using a professional representative (the ‘PR’) – wrote to the Lender on 4 January 2019 (the ‘Letter of Complaint’) to raise a number of different concerns about the Fractional Club and the associated Credit Agreement. As those concerns haven’t changed since they were first raised, and as both sides are familiar with them, it isn’t necessary to repeat them in detail here beyond the summary above. The Lender did not send a response to the complaint (it later said it did not receive it) so the complaint was referred to the Financial Ombudsman Service. It was assessed by an Investigator who, having considered the information on file, upheld the complaint on its merits. The Investigator thought that the Supplier had marketed and sold Fractional Club membership as an investment to Mr and Mrs G at the Time of Sale in breach of Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare, Holiday Products, Resale and Exchange Contracts Regulations 2010 (the ‘Timeshare Regulations’). And given the impact of that breach on their purchasing decision, the Investigator concluded that the credit relationship between the Lender and Mrs G was rendered unfair to her for the purposes of Section 140A of the CCA.

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The Lender disagreed with the Investigator’s assessment and asked for an Ombudsman’s decision – which is why it was passed to me. The provisional decision I considered the matter and issued a provisional decision (the ‘PD’) setting out my initial thoughts on the merits of Mrs G’s complaint. In the PD I said: “I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. And having done that, I do not currently think this complaint should be upheld. However, before I explain why, I want to make it clear that my role as an Ombudsman is not to address every single point that has been made to date. Instead, it is to decide what is fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. So, if I have not commented on, or referred to, something that either party has said, that does not mean I have not considered it. Section 75 of the CCA: the Supplier’s misrepresentations at the Time of Sale The CCA introduced a regime of connected lender liability under Section 75 that affords consumers (“debtors”) a right of recourse against lenders that provide the finance for the acquisition of goods or services from third-party merchants (“suppliers”) in the event that there is an actionable misrepresentation and/or breach of contract by the supplier. Certain conditions must be met if the protection afforded to consumers is engaged, including, for instance, the cash price of the purchase and the nature of the arrangements between the parties involved in the transaction. The Lender doesn’t dispute that the relevant conditions are met. But for reasons I’ll come on to below, it isn’t necessary to make any formal findings on them here. It was said in the Letter of Complaint that Fractional Club membership had been misrepresented by the Supplier at the Time of Sale because Mr and Mrs G were: (1) Told by the Supplier that Fractional Club membership had a guaranteed end date when that was not true. (2) Told by the Supplier that Fractional Club membership was an “investment” when that was not true. However, telling prospective members that they were investing their money because they were buying a fraction or share of one of the Supplier’s properties was not untrue. After all, a share in an allocated property was, by its very nature, an investment. And while, as I understand it, the sale of the Allocated Property could be postponed in certain circumstances according to the Fractional Club Rules, Mr and Mrs G say little to nothing to persuade me that they were given a guarantee by the Supplier that the Allocated Property would be sold on a specific date when such a promise would have been impossible to stand by given the inevitable uncertainty of selling property some way into the future. And as there’s nothing else on file to support the PR’s allegation, I’m not persuaded that there was a representation by the Supplier on the issue in question that constituted a false statement of fact. So, while I recognise that Mrs G and the PR have concerns about the way in which Fractional Club membership was sold by the Supplier, when looking at the claim under

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Section 75 of the CCA, I can only consider whether there was a factual and material misrepresentation by the Supplier. For the reasons I’ve set out above, I’m not persuaded that there was. And that means that I don’t think that the Lender acted unreasonably or unfairly in not accepting this particular Section 75 claim. Section 75 of the CCA: the Supplier’s Breach of Contract I have already summarised how Section 75 of the CCA works and why it gives consumers a right of recourse against a lender. So, it is not necessary to repeat that here other than to say that, if I find that the Supplier is liable for having breached the Purchase Agreement, the Lender is also liable. The Letter of Complaint says that Mr and Mrs G could not holiday where and when they wanted to – which, on my reading of the complaint, suggests that the Supplier was not living up to its end of the bargain, potentially breaching the Purchase Agreement. Yet, like any holiday accommodation, availability was not unlimited – given the higher demand at peak times, like school holidays for instance. Some of the sales paperwork likely to have been signed by Mr and Mrs G states that the availability of holidays was/is subject to demand. It also looks like they made use of their fractional points to holiday on a number of occasions. I accept that they may not have been able to take certain holidays, but I have not seen enough to persuade me that the Supplier had breached the terms of the Purchase Agreement. So, from the evidence I have seen, I do not think the Lender is liable to pay Mrs G any compensation for a breach of contract by the Supplier. And with that being the case, I do not think the Lender acted unfairly or unreasonably in relation to this aspect of the complaint either. Section 140A of the CCA: did the Lender participate in an unfair credit relationship? I’ve already explained why I’m not persuaded that Fractional Club membership was actionably misrepresented by the Supplier at the Time of Sale, nor that the contract was breached. But there are other aspects of the sales process that, being the subject of dissatisfaction, I must explore with Section 140A in mind if I’m to consider this complaint in full – which is what I’ve done next. Having considered the entirety of the credit relationship between Mrs G and the Lender along with all of the circumstances of the complaint, I don’t think the credit relationship between them was likely to have been rendered unfair for the purposes of Section 140A. When coming to that conclusion, and in carrying out my analysis, I have looked at: 1. The standard of the Supplier’s commercial conduct – which includes its sales and marketing practices at the Time of Sale; 2. The provision of information by the Supplier at the Time of Sale, including the contractual documentation and disclaimers made by the Supplier; 3. The commission arrangements between the Lender and the Supplier at the Time of Sale and the disclosure of those arrangements; 4. Evidence provided by both parties on what was likely to have been said and/or done at the Time of Sale; and 5. The inherent probabilities of the sale given its circumstances.

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I have then considered the impact of these on the fairness of the credit relationship between Mrs G and the Lender. The Supplier’s sales & marketing practices at the Time of Sale Mrs G’s complaint about the Lender being party to an unfair credit relationship was and is made for several reasons. The PR says, for instance that: 1. The right checks weren’t carried out before the Lender lent to Mrs G; and 2. Mr and Mrs G were pressured by the Supplier into purchasing Fractional Club membership at the Time of Sale. However, as things currently stand, neither of these strike me as a reason why this complaint should succeed. I haven’t seen anything to persuade me that the right checks weren’t carried out by the Lender given this complaint’s circumstances. But even if I were to find that the Lender failed to do everything it should have when it agreed to lend (and I make no such finding), I would have to be satisfied that the money lent to Mrs G was actually unaffordable, before also concluding that she lost out as a result, and then consider whether the credit relationship with the Lender was unfair to her for this reason. But from the information provided, I am not satisfied that the lending was unaffordable for Mrs G. And as regards the allegation that Mr and Mrs G were put under undue pressure at the Time of Sale, I acknowledge that they may have felt weary after a sales process that went on for a long time. But they say little about what was said and/or done by the Supplier during their sales presentation that made them feel as if they had no choice but to purchase Fractional Club membership when they simply did not want to. They were also given a 14-day cooling off period and they have not provided a credible explanation for why they did not cancel their membership during that time. And with all of that being the case, there is insufficient evidence to demonstrate that Mr and Mrs G made the decision to purchase Fractional Club membership because their ability to exercise that choice was significantly impaired by pressure from the Supplier. Overall, therefore, I don’t think that Mrs G’s credit relationship with the Lender was rendered unfair to her under Section 140A for any of the reasons above. But there is another reason, perhaps the main reason, why the PR says the credit relationship with the Lender was unfair to Mrs G. And that’s the suggestion that Fractional Club membership was marketed and sold to her and Mr G as an investment in breach of prohibition against selling timeshares in that way. The Supplier’s alleged breach of Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare Regulations A share in the Allocated Property clearly constituted an investment as it offered Mr and Mrs G the prospect of a financial return – whether or not, like all investments, that was more than what they first put into it. But it is important to note at this stage that the fact that Fractional Club membership included an investment element did not, itself, transgress the prohibition in Regulation 14(3). That provision prohibits the marketing and selling of a timeshare contract as an investment. It doesn’t prohibit the mere existence of an investment element in a timeshare contract or prohibit the marketing and selling of such a timeshare contract per se.

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In other words, the Timeshare Regulations did not ban products such as the Fractional Club. They just regulated how such products were marketed and sold. To conclude, therefore, that Fractional Club membership was marketed or sold to Mr and Mrs G as an investment in breach of Regulation 14(3), I have to be persuaded that it was more likely than not that the Supplier marketed and/or sold membership to them as an investment, i.e. told them or led them to believe that Fractional Club membership offered them the prospect of a financial gain (i.e., a profit) given the facts and circumstances of this complaint. And there is competing evidence in this complaint as to whether Fractional Club membership was marketed and/or sold by the Supplier at the Time of Sale as an investment in breach of Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare Regulations. On the one hand, it is clear that the Supplier made efforts to avoid specifically describing membership of the Fractional Club as an ‘investment’ or quantifying to prospective purchasers, such as Mr and Mrs G, the financial value of their share in the net sales proceeds of the Allocated Property along with the investment considerations, risks and rewards attached to them. But on the other hand, I acknowledge that the Supplier’s sales process left open the possibility that the sales representative may have positioned Fractional Club membership as an investment. And this is what Mr G has said happened in his testimony. So, I accept that it’s equally possible that Fractional Club membership was marketed and sold to Mr and Mrs G as an investment in breach of Regulation 14(3). However, whether or not there was a breach of the relevant prohibition by the Supplier is not ultimately determinative of the outcome in this complaint for reasons I will come on to shortly. And with that being the case, it’s not necessary to make a formal finding on that particular issue for the purposes of this decision. Would the credit relationship between the Lender and Mrs G have been rendered unfair to her had there been a breach of Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare Regulations? Having found that it was possible that the Supplier breached Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare Regulations at the Time of Sale, I now need to consider what impact that breach (if there was one) had on the fairness of the credit relationship between Mrs G and the Lender under the Credit Agreement and related Purchase Agreement, as the case law on Section 140A makes it clear that regulatory breaches do not automatically create unfairness for the purposes of that provision. Such breaches and their consequences (if there are any) must be considered in the round, rather than in a narrow or technical way. Indeed, it seems to me that if I am to conclude that a breach of Regulation 14(3) led to a credit relationship between Mrs G and the Lender that was unfair to her and warranted relief as a result, whether the Supplier’s breach of Regulation 14(3) led her and Mr G to enter into the Purchase Agreement and Mrs G into the Credit Agreement is an important consideration. But I am not persuaded by the evidence submitted, that the prospect of a financial gain from Fractional Club membership was an important and motivating factor when Mr and Mrs G decided to go ahead with their purchase. I’ll explain. As part of the PR’s initial submissions to this Service, it sent a statement from Mr G. This was unsigned, but dated 23 November 2017, and set out his and Mrs G’s recollections of their entire relationship with the Supplier from their first purchase in 2004, up until their purchase of the Fractional Club at the Time of Sale.

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But I have some concerns as to how much weight I can place on what is said in this statement when determining what likely happened here. As I’ve said, the statement is unsigned, but is dated 23 November 2017. I think it is likely that it was written around that time, because I have seen evidence from the PR that a telephone call was scheduled to be made with Mr and Mrs G on 9 October 2017 to take the statement. And from what I know about how this particular PR worked, it seems likely that it would have written the statement following this telephone conversation. However, it is unclear why the statement is dated 23 November 2017 as this was not the date the call was scheduled to occur. But there are several anomalies in the statement which make me doubt its accuracy, and therefore how much weight I can place on what has been said. For example, when Mr G is describing their first timeshare purchase in 2004 he says: “The representatives went on to tell us that purchasing a membership was purchasing in property which would be a valuable investment for us and our family future. We liked the thought of leaving an investment to our family and considered purchasing a membership.” Now I find it inherently unlikely that the sales representative would have positioned this particular membership as an investment. This membership had no investment element to it. It was not asset backed and was purely a points-based membership whereby the member would exchange their points every year for holiday accommodation. So I do not understand why Mr G would have said this membership was sold and/or marketed to him and Mrs G as an investment. I have considered that perhaps they were describing the membership as an investment in holidays for the future, but Mr G’s description of their next purchase does not suggest that. When talking about their purchase in 2013, he says: “We went along and we were then told about a new product called fractional points. These points would mean that we would still have an investment for our families' future in a property but that we would have a final date when we would be able to sell our property [sic] of on 2027.” (bold my emphasis). Here, Mr G explicitly describes his points-based membership as “an investment…in property”. And as I’ve said, this membership was not an investment in property. It was not asset-backed in any way. But at the 2013 sale Mr and Mrs G bought a fractional membership, which was backed by an allocated property in Spain1. Mr G then goes on to describe their purchase of the Fractional Club, and the reasons why they bought it. He says: “In 2015, we were on holiday in [sic] at Cromer Country Club when we were approached by the [Supplier] representatives. They told us that if we purchased more points to take us to Gold Membership, we would be able to make a further investment in UK property as well as the property we had in [sic] Los Amegios. The representatives told us that the UK property always made more money than the European properties. We were also advised that a Gold membership would give us priority bookings and other benefits. As the Cromer Club was very nice and as the representatives offered us 10000 for a special 1 A complaint about this purchase and the associated lending has been dealt with separately by this Service.

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price of 10000 points for a cost of £12200.00 the finance of which, was arranged by the representatives through Hitachi Capital. […] Lastly and more importantly, we were told that we would be investing in property and that this would be an investment for our families' future. We were advised that UK property was much more valuable than European property and that purchasing fractional points would allow us to invest in property in both. We were led to believe that we could sell our investments in 2027 and have now been told by [redacted] who have taken over from [the Supplier] that all those who have fractional investments in the property must also want to sell at this time. We have also been advised that there is little or no return on our investment now due to fractional points decreasing in value. In all the circumstances, I now wish to relinquish my timeshare product, cancel the contract and make a consumer credit claim for miss-selling by the representatives.” But there are, in my view, significant inconsistencies in this part of the statement which also make me doubt its accuracy, and therefore how much weight I can place on what it says. For example, it starts by saying they were on holiday at Cromer Country Club. This is incorrect – I have seen that they were in fact in Spain when they made this purchase. Cromer Country Club was where the Allocated Property is located. This suggests to me that the statement was likely completed from the information on the contractual documentation, not from what Mr G has actually said. I acknowledge that Mr G goes into some detail about how the Fractional Club was positioned as an investment, and indeed a better investment than their Spanish-based property. But the most significant inconsistency is contained in the final two paragraphs. In these Mr G says: “We have also been advised that there is little or no return on our investment now due to fractional points decreasing in value. In all the circumstances, I now wish to relinquish my timeshare product, cancel the contract and make a consumer credit claim for miss-selling by the representatives.” But this statement was apparently written seven months after Mr and Mrs G voluntarily surrendered their membership. And the statement makes it sound like they were still active members and that there was little likely return on their investment due to a decrease in value. Whereas they actually no longer had the membership at that time. It seems to me, from reading the statement, that there is doubt that it is actually Mr G’s own recollections of events. There are, in my view, significant inconsistencies in what has been written which could suggest that Mr G’s own recollections have been affected by the complaints process – after all, he has written that his first points-based membership was an investment in property, whereas it clearly isn’t, and it is highly unlikely that the sales personnel would have positioned it as such. Or the other possibility is that what is written is not an accurate reflection of what he said. Either way, I do not feel able to place sufficient weight on what has been presented. I have also looked at the circumstances at the Time of Sale to see if this can assist me in understanding Mr and Mrs G’s likely motivation to make the purchase. As I’ve said, they were existing members, holding a membership of 20,000 fractional points and fractional rights in a property in Spain. This membership was not traded in towards their purchase of the Fractional Club, so the purchase afforded Mr and Mrs G a significant

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increase – 50% - in holiday rights. I can also see that they were given an incentive of an extra one-off allocation of 10,000 points, which they used for a holiday in October 2015. So holidays, and specifically the type of holidays the Supplier could provide, were clearly important to them. And I’ve seen no evidence that I feel able to rely on which suggests they bought the Fractional Club membership as an investment. I think they most likely bought it for the additional holidays it could provide. And my thoughts on that are strengthened by what happened in 2017. Mr and Mrs G contacted the Supplier and voluntarily surrendered their memberships, setting out in their own words, their reasons for this in their letter to the Supplier dated 16 March 2017: “Further to my previous telephone conversation with the [Supplier] Forum via Facebook, I would like to hand our Points and Fractional weeks membership back due to the inability to use due to illness. I understand this criteria you will take into consideration as an Exceptional Circumstance. I enclose for your immediate attention a recent [sic] Doctors letter explaining in detail my ongoing health issues which will now limit my holidaying in future and so renders the membership useless and without purpose.” The action of voluntarily handing back the membership does not seem to align with the actions of someone who bought the membership as an investment. I understand that personal circumstances can change and health problems can occur, but to surrender something that cost a not insignificant sum which was allegedly bought for its investment potential, for no return, does not suggest that it was bought as an investment. That doesn’t mean they weren’t interested in a share in the Allocated Property when it was bought. After all, that wouldn’t be surprising given the nature of the product at the centre of this complaint. But as there is no evidence that I find reliable that would persuade me that their purchase was motivated by their share in the Allocated Property and the possibility of a profit, I don’t think a breach of Regulation 14(3) by the Supplier was likely to have been material to the decision they ultimately made. I think it was bought for the holidays it could provide. On balance, therefore, even if the Supplier had marketed or sold the Fractional Club membership as an investment in breach of Regulation 14(3) of the Timeshare Regulations, I am not persuaded that Mr and Mrs G’s decision to purchase Fractional Club membership at the Time of Sale was motivated by the prospect of a financial gain (i.e., a profit). On the contrary, I think the evidence suggests they would have pressed ahead with their purchase whether or not there had been a breach of Regulation 14(3). And for that reason, I do not think the credit relationship between Mrs G and the Lender was unfair to her even if the Supplier had breached Regulation 14(3). The provision of information by the Supplier at the Time of Sale The PR says that a payment of commission from the Lender to the Supplier at the Time of Sale should lead me to uphold this complaint because, simply put, information in relation to that payment went undisclosed at the Time of Sale. As both sides already know, the Supreme Court handed down an important judgment on 1 August 2025 in a series of cases concerned with the issue of commission: Johnson v FirstRand Bank Ltd, Wrench v FirstRand Bank Ltd and Hopcraft v Close Brothers Ltd [2025] UKSC 33 (‘Hopcraft, Johnson and Wrench’). The Supreme Court ruled that, in each of the three cases, the commission payments made to car dealers by lenders were legal, as claims for the tort of bribery, or the dishonest assistance of a breach of fiduciary duty, had to be predicated on the car dealer owing a

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fiduciary duty to the consumer, which the car dealers did not owe. A “disinterested duty”, as described in Wood v Commercial First Business Ltd & ors and Business Mortgage Finance 4 plc v Pengelly [2021] EWCA Civ 471, is not enough. However, the Supreme Court held that the credit relationship between the lender and Mr Johnson was unfair under Section 140A of the CCA because of the commission paid by the lender to the car dealer. The main reasons for coming to that conclusion included, amongst other things, the following factors: 1. The size of the commission (as a percentage of the total charge for credit). In Mr Johnson’s case it was 55%. This was “so high” and “a powerful indication that the relationship…was unfair” (see paragraph 327); 2. The failure to disclose the commission; and 3. The concealment of the commercial tie between the car dealer and the lender. The Supreme Court also confirmed that the following factors, in what was a non-exhaustive list, will normally be relevant when assessing whether a credit relationship was/is unfair under Section 140A of the CCA: 1. The size of the commission as a proportion of the charge for credit; 2. The way in which commission is calculated (a discretionary commission arrangement, for example, may lead to higher interest rates); 3. The characteristics of the consumer; 4. The extent of any disclosure and the manner of that disclosure (which, insofar as Section 56 of the CCA is engaged, includes any disclosure by a supplier when acting as a broker); and 5. Compliance with the regulatory rules. From my reading of the Supreme Court’s judgment in Hopcraft, Johnson and Wrench, it sets out principles which apply to credit brokers other than car dealer–credit brokers. So, when considering allegations of undisclosed payments of commission like the one in this complaint, Hopcraft, Johnson and Wrench is relevant law that I’m required to consider under Rule 3.6.4 of the Financial Conduct Authority’s Dispute Resolution Rules (‘DISP’). But I don’t think Hopcraft, Johnson and Wrench assists Mrs G in arguing that her credit relationship with the Lender was unfair to her for reasons relating to commission given the facts and circumstances of this complaint. I haven’t seen anything to suggest that the Lender and Supplier were tied to one another contractually or commercially in a way that wasn’t properly disclosed to Mrs G, nor have I seen anything that persuades me that the commission arrangement between them gave the Supplier a choice over the interest rate that led Mrs G into a credit agreement that cost disproportionately more than it otherwise could have. I acknowledge that it’s possible that the Lender and the Supplier failed to follow the regulatory guidance in place at the Time of Sale insofar as it was relevant to disclosing the commission arrangements between them. But as I’ve said before, the case law on Section 140A makes it clear that regulatory breaches do not automatically create unfairness for the purposes of that provision. Such breaches and their consequences (if there are any) must be considered in the round, rather than in a narrow or technical way.

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And with that being the case, it isn’t necessary to make a formal finding on that because, even if the Lender and the Supplier failed to follow the relevant regulatory guidance at the Time of Sale, it is for the reasons set out below that I don’t currently think any such failure is itself a reason to find the credit relationship in question unfair to Mrs G. Based on what I’ve seen so far, the Supplier’s role as a credit broker wasn’t a separate service and distinct from its role as the seller of timeshares. It was simply a means to an end in the Supplier’s overall pursuit of a successful timeshare sale. I can’t see that the Supplier gave an undertaking – either expressly or impliedly – to put to one side its commercial interests in pursuit of that goal when arranging the Credit Agreement. And as it wasn’t acting as an agent of Mrs G but as the supplier of contractual rights she obtained under the Purchase Agreement, the transaction doesn’t strike me as one with features that suggest the Supplier had an obligation of ‘loyalty’ to her when arranging the Credit Agreement and thus a fiduciary duty. What’s more, in stark contrast to the facts of Mr Johnson’s case, as I understand it, the Lender didn’t pay the Supplier any commission at the Time of Sale. And with that being the case, even if there were information failings at that time and regulatory failings as a result (which I make no formal finding on), I’m not currently persuaded that the commission arrangements between the Supplier and the Lender were likely to have led to a sufficiently extreme inequality of knowledge that rendered the credit relationship unfair to Mrs G. Overall, therefore, I’m not currently persuaded that the commission arrangements between the Supplier and the Lender were likely to have led to a sufficiently extreme inequality of knowledge that rendered the credit relationship unfair to Mrs G. Overall Conclusion In conclusion, given the facts and circumstances of this complaint, I do not think that the Lender acted unfairly or unreasonably when it dealt with Mrs G’s Section 75 claims, and I am not persuaded that the Lender was party to a credit relationship with her under the Credit Agreement and related Purchase Agreement that was unfair to her for the purposes of Section 140A of the CCA. And having taken everything into account, I see no other reason why it would be fair or reasonable to direct the Lender to compensate Mrs G.” The responses to the provisional decision The Lender responded to the PD and accepted it. The PR, on Mrs G’s behalf, did not accept it, but provided no further evidence that it wished me to consider. Having received the relevant responses from both sides, I am now finalising my decision. The legal and regulatory context In considering what is fair and reasonable in all the circumstances of the complaint, I am required under DISP 3.6.4R to take into account: relevant (i) law and regulations; (ii) regulators’ rules, guidance and standards; and (iii) codes of practice; and (where appropriate), what I consider to have been good industry practice at the relevant time. The legal and regulatory context that I think is relevant to this complaint is, in many ways, no different to that shared in several hundred published ombudsman decisions on very similar complaints – which can be found on the Financial Ombudsman Service’s website. And with that being the case, it is not necessary to set out that context in detail here. But I would add that the following regulatory rules/guidance are also relevant:

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The Consumer Credit Sourcebook (‘CONC’) – Found in the Financial Conduct Authority’s (the ‘FCA’) Handbook of Rules and Guidance Below are the most relevant provisions and/or guidance as they were at the relevant time: • CONC 3.7.3 [R] • CONC 4.5.3 [R] • CONC 4.5.2 [G] The FCA’s Principles The rules on consumer credit sit alongside the wider obligations of firms, such as the Principles for Businesses (‘PRIN’). Set out below are those that are most relevant to this complaint: • Principle 6 • Principle 7 • Principle 8 What I’ve decided – and why I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. Following the responses from both sides, I’ve considered the case afresh. And having done so, and because no new evidence has been submitted or arguments made in response to my initial findings, I see no reason to depart from the outcome as set out in the provisional decision above. Given the facts and circumstances of this complaint, I do not think that the Lender acted unfairly or unreasonably when it dealt with Mrs G’s Section 75 claims, and I am not persuaded that the Lender was party to a credit relationship with her under the Credit Agreement that was unfair to her for the purposes of Section 140A of the CCA. And having taken everything into account, I see no other reason why it would be fair or reasonable to direct the Lender to compensate Mrs G. My final decision I do not uphold this complaint. Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mrs G to accept or reject my decision before 28 April 2026. Chris Riggs Ombudsman

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