Not upheld: Pension transfer advice complaint against ReAssure Limited

Decision detail

Summary

Mrs S complained that ReAssure incorrectly reported her pension settlement as being paid in the 2025/26 tax year rather than the 2024/25 tax year. ReAssure staff members told her the P45 would be amended to show an earlier payment date, but the company later confirmed the settlement was correctly reported based on the actual payment date of 8 April 2025. Mrs S spent months chasing ReAssure for the promised amended P45 before making a formal complaint. The ombudsman upheld ReAssure's position that the tax year reporting was correct under HMRC requirements, but agreed that ReAssure's false assurances about amending the P45 caused unnecessary distress and inconvenience. The ombudsman found the £500 compensation award to be fair and reasonable for this error.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman found that ReAssure correctly reported the pension settlement in the 2025/26 tax year because HMRC uses the payment date (8 April 2025) to determine the tax year, not the application date. ReAssure processed the payment within four working days of receiving the forms, which was within its ten working day service level agreement, and could not have reasonably made the payment in the previous tax year. However, ReAssure erred in telling Mrs S that the P45 would be amended, creating false expectations and causing her to waste time chasing updates over several months. The ombudsman agreed that compensation was warranted for this error and determined that £500 fell within the appropriate range (£300-£750) for mistakes causing considerable distress, inconvenience and disruption lasting over many weeks or months.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website