Not upheld: service failure - account location difficulty and account setup dispute complaint against Coventry Building Society

Decision detail

Summary

Mr C complained that Coventry Building Society caused him distress when it could not initially locate his 5 Access Saver account when he called to confirm receipt of a transfer on 15 December 2025. The account was eventually found within 10 minutes, but Mr C disputed Coventry's assertion that he had set up the account online. The ombudsman found that the initial confusion arose because Mr C provided incorrect account numbers for closed accounts, not due to any Coventry error. Call recordings from October 2023 confirmed that Mr C had been advised the account could only be set up online and that he had completed the application himself. The ombudsman upheld Coventry's £50 compensation as fair and reasonable for the one-off incident and did not uphold the complaint.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman found that the initial difficulty locating the account was caused by Mr C providing incorrect account numbers for closed accounts, not by any error on Coventry's part. Once the correct account number was provided, the account was located and confirmed within a reasonable timeframe (4 minutes for confirmation, 10 minutes total call duration). The ombudsman was satisfied from call recordings that Mr C did complete the online application himself as advised. The £50 compensation was considered fair and reasonable for a one-off incident of distress.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website