A double-digit fall, but not an isolated one
In the most recent 90-day window measured by Veste, the Financial Ombudsman's published decisions on motor finance complaints, covering Personal Contract Purchase, Hire Purchase and related conditional sale agreements, showed an uphold rate of 24.2%. In the preceding 90-day window the rate stood at 34.2%. That is a fall of 10.0 percentage points, and it happened alongside a rise in decision volume, from 830 decisions in the prior window to 989 in the current one, an increase of 159 decisions, or 19.2%. Both windows comfortably exceed the minimum sample size Veste applies for reliable comparison, so this is not a case of a handful of decisions skewing the numbers.
What makes this worth examining is not the single comparison in isolation, but where it sits inside a longer run of monthly data. Veste's monthly series for motor finance covers 25 months, from May 2024 to May 2026, and the direction of travel over that period is unmistakably downward, albeit unevenly so.
The numbers in full
Across the entire published record Veste holds for motor finance, dating from 4 April 2013 to 19 May 2026, there have been 19,203 decisions. Of these, 6,298 were upheld in full, 1,938 were partially upheld, and 10,967 were not upheld, giving an overall uphold rate across the whole history of 37.8%. That long-run figure, built on more than thirteen years of decisions, sits well above the current 24.2% reading and above the 34.2% prior-window reading too, underlining that the recent months represent a marked shift from the historical norm for this product, not merely a spell of average variation.
Veste's uphold rate follows the standard formula: (fully upheld decisions plus half of partially upheld decisions) divided by total decisions. That convention means a case that is partially upheld counts as half a win for the complainant, which is worth bearing in mind when comparing categories with different mixes of full and partial outcomes.
For context, the uphold rate across Veste's entire corpus of 399,206 Financial Ombudsman decisions, covering all products and complaint types, stands at 28.9%. Motor finance's current 24.2% reading is therefore now below the all-sector baseline, having spent most of its recent history above it.
Year by year, the direction is consistent
Veste's annual figures reinforce the pattern seen in the 90-day comparison. In 2022, motor finance decisions carried an uphold rate of 40.0% across 1,500 decisions. In 2023 it was 39.1% across 1,354 decisions. In 2024 it eased slightly to 38.7% across 1,763 decisions. In 2025, decision volume rose sharply to 2,938 and the uphold rate fell to 35.5%. In the partial year to date for 2026, covering 1,417 decisions so far, the rate has fallen further still, to 26.7%.
That is five consecutive annual readings without an increase, each meeting Veste's minimum sample threshold. Volume has broadly grown across the same period, from 1,500 decisions in 2022 to 2,938 in 2025, meaning the Ombudsman is publishing more motor finance decisions each year while a smaller proportion of them are being upheld.
What the monthly trend shows
The month-by-month data adds useful texture. Early in the 25-month series, monthly uphold rates were often above 40%: June 2024 recorded 43.2% from 133 decisions, October 2024 recorded 45.1% from 215 decisions, and March 2025 recorded 45.2% from 219 decisions. From around the middle of 2025 onward, both volume and uphold rate began to move in different directions. August 2025 saw 292 decisions at a 30.8% uphold rate. September 2025 was the largest single month in the series, with 386 decisions, and the uphold rate fell to 29.9%. October 2025 recorded 242 decisions at 27.7%.
The most recent months show the lowest readings in the series. February 2026 recorded 284 decisions at 26.9%. March 2026 was the largest month by volume in the entire 25-month run, 504 decisions, with an uphold rate of 23.2%, the lowest monthly figure recorded. April 2026 saw 236 decisions at 23.5%, and the partial month of May 2026, up to the article date, recorded 137 decisions at 26.6%.
The consistency of the decline across several consecutive months, rather than a single anomalous month, is what distinguishes this from ordinary statistical noise. A single low month within a volatile monthly series would warrant caution. Several consecutive months in the 23% to 30% range, following a longer run mostly above 35%, is a more durable pattern, though it remains a pattern in published outcomes rather than in the underlying merits of any individual complaint.
Firm mix and what it does and doesn't explain
Veste's top firms table for motor finance lists ten businesses, all meeting the minimum sample size, with uphold rates ranging from 28.6% (Moneybarn No. 1 Limited, 1,080 decisions) up to 53.7% (Close Brothers Limited, 620 decisions). Volkswagen Financial Services (UK) Limited is the largest single business by volume in the table, with 1,724 decisions and an uphold rate of 31.1%. Mercedes-Benz Financial Services UK Limited recorded 1,138 decisions at 33.4%. Black Horse Limited recorded 1,043 decisions at 29.1%. Santander Consumer (UK) Plc, by contrast, recorded a higher uphold rate of 49.1% across 784 decisions, and BMW Financial Services (GB) Limited appears twice in the table under two slightly different name spellings, with 716 decisions at 47.7% and 694 decisions at 46.1% respectively. As Veste's methodology notes, firms are counted by the exact business name recorded on each decision, so entities belonging to the same corporate group, or even the same firm recorded with minor spelling variations, are not merged, and BMW's split entry illustrates that directly.
The range across these ten firms, from 28.6% to 53.7%, is wide enough that the overall product-level fall cannot be attributed to any single firm's figures without further breakdown by time period, which Veste's current dataset does not provide at firm level. It would be inaccurate to say any named firm's recent performance has driven the product-wide trend; the top firms figures shown here are cumulative totals, not the same 90-day windows used in the period comparison.
Complaint categories tell a related but distinct story
Veste's related-category data offers a further angle. Complaints categorised as PCP / HP mis-selling carry a notably low uphold rate of 20.0% across 2,426 decisions. Irresponsible lending complaints, a broader and much-discussed category within motor finance, show an uphold rate of 34.3% across 2,812 decisions. Separately, complaints specifically about motor finance commission arrangements (sometimes referred to as discretionary commission arrangements) show an uphold rate of just 0.8% across 184 decisions, among the lowest of any category in Veste's related list. These are complaint-type categories rather than a breakdown of the motor finance product trend by time, but they show that within motor finance overall, the type of complaint being raised matters enormously to the eventual outcome, potentially more than which firm is involved.
Individual decisions as illustration
Veste's case examples from the most recent decision date, 19 May 2026, show both outcomes side by side. In one case, Moneybarn No.1 Limited's affordability checks on a conditional sale agreement were found inadequate in method, but the Ombudsman concluded that proportionate checks would still have shown the lending was affordable, and the complaint was not upheld. In another, Oodle Financial Services Limited was found to have provided a car finance loan without adequate checks despite visible signs of credit reliance and a recent default, and the complaint was upheld with a refund and adverse credit file corrections ordered. A third case against Mercedes-Benz Financial Services UK Limited, concerning a car fault following a dealership-arranged service, was not upheld because the service itself fell outside the finance agreement. A fourth, against Ferrari Financial Services GmbH, was upheld after an expert inspection supported a complainant's case that a new car supplied under hire purchase remained of unsatisfactory quality despite repair attempts, with a full unwind of the agreement ordered.
These four decisions cannot be taken as representative of the wider trend; they simply show the range of reasoning the Ombudsman applies within this product, from affordability assessments to consumer rights over goods supplied under finance agreements.
What the data does and does not tell us
The data shows a clear, multi-month decline in the proportion of published motor finance decisions favouring complainants, alongside rising volume of decisions being published. It does not show why. Possible explanations, none of which the data confirms on its own, include changes in the mix of complaint types reaching final decision stage, changes in the proportion of straightforward versus contested cases being escalated to a decision, or shifts in how the Ombudsman is applying established principles to a growing caseload. Veste's dataset does not include information on case type mix within the recent 90-day windows specifically, so any explanation beyond the observed rate and volume movement would be speculation.
It is also worth restating that published Ombudsman decisions are not the same population as all complaints made to firms; many complaints are resolved before reaching a published final decision, and this dataset captures only those that were.
The practical implication
For complainants and firms alike, the clearest takeaway is that the balance of published outcomes in motor finance has shifted meaningfully over the past year, from an uphold rate in the high 30s in 2024 to the mid-20s in the most recent 90-day window, against a backdrop of rising decision volume. Anyone assessing the likely outcome of a motor finance complaint today, whether preparing a case or defending one, is working against a materially different backdrop than existed even twelve months ago, and the category of complaint, rather than the identity of the lender alone, appears to carry substantial weight in that outcome.