Not upheld: interest charges application and customer service failures complaint against Brachers LLP

Decision detail

Summary

Miss K complained that Brachers LLP inappropriately applied interest to her credit card balance and provided poor customer service by failing to respond to her communications. The core interest issue was resolved when the lender refunded £50.48 in July 2025. The ombudsman examined Miss K's customer service complaints and found that Brachers responded to her emails within reasonable timeframes: a 7-day response to a March 2025 email and a 6-day response to complaint emails sent in June 2025. The ombudsman also found no evidence supporting Miss K's allegations of racist or discriminatory treatment. The complaint was not upheld.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman found that the core issue of interest being applied had been resolved through the refund. Regarding customer service complaints, the ombudsman found that Brachers responded to the 30 March 2025 email within a reasonable timeframe (7 days), responded to the four emails sent on 13 June 2025 within six days (well within the eight-week complaint response deadline), and appropriately investigated further when Miss K provided additional information. The ombudsman found no evidence of unreasonable response times or differential treatment. Regarding allegations of racism, the ombudsman found Brachers to have been polite and professional throughout and saw no evidence of discriminatory treatment.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website