Can anyone make sense of this letter from Sainsbury’s bank?

[Usernamenotavailabletryanother]

My DM died six years ago, and had outstanding debts which were paid off by her estate.

One of these debts was an unsecured loan from Sainsbury’s bank. Have recently received the attached letter; obviously I will call them to discuss, but does anyone know why they are sending this?

I am reluctant to sign anything until I understand what they are offering and why…

Any info on recent legislation/financial practice would be much appreciated.

Guessing they were shits to her during a period when she was sick, and they stuffed her with a load of fees and they’d rather give it back than catch the bad press and possible compliance audit if word got out.

Yes, it seems like they’ve either missold or mistreated a vulnerable customer and are now attempting to make amends - I assume they have some sort of obligation to do this rather than it being through the goodness of their heart but either way they owe you (the estate) money.

At a guess the deceased had a loan account with the bank, or perhaps an overdraft. Between the dates mentioned various charges were applied to the account. The bank now recognises that, perhaps because of the deceased's health or personal circumstances around that time (bereavement?) , they should have been more helpful and understanding.

They are therefore reimbursing the charges together with interest.

Without more details of the nature of the account and what exactly happened during that fortnight it's difficult to offer an opinion as to whether the estate should accept the offer or press for more.

Sounds like they've had an audit and they've either offered her more credit than was financially affordable or they didn't treat the account correctly due to her circumstances and they want to refund some interest rather than suffer any bad press etc.

Suspect it's come about as a result of the new Consumer Duty rules and they've conducted a retrospective review.

www.fca.org.uk/news/news-stories/consumer-duty-higher-standards-financial-services#:~:text=The%20new%20rules%2C%20known%20as,needs%20and%20offer%20fair%20value

Oh that's interesting. It's such a shame Sainsbury Bank didn't behave in a decent way to your mother while she was still alive, though.

As above I'd assume that they were charging interest and fees after her death in error and are returning those fees with interest.

My guess is they didn't uphold their policies upon death and carried on charging the account. They now want to compensate the estate of your mother and are asking you to sign an indemnity so they can pay as a full and final settlement and not be chased for more compensation.

NAL

I am a bit of a cynic and with the amount of time lapsed would be tempted to call a known Sainsburys number to confirm it isn't a scam first.

It's a remediation exercise. Every bank has project teams that work on several campaigns at a time.

They've picked up some breach of their policy or service level agreement from the time period mentioned and have agreed a generic redress approach - there will be a number of customers who've received the same letter. They'll do it in tranches, so this latest batch of letters will be all account holders identified but since deceased.

It's a box ticking exercise for banks to show their regulators they're putting things right, acting with integrity bla bla. In my experience it's not worth asking/fighting for any more unless something really drastic happened (and if this was the case you'd have probably complained already) or you'll just get sucked into back and forth/complaints process/ombudsman etc.

What @BlackberryCrumbs says!

This is so helpful, thank you @BlackberryCrumbs . I’ll take whatever they’re offering in that case.

Thanks to everyone who answered, and thank you @Bookish88 for that link. I think you’re right, @buzzlightyearsgloves- the period covers 5 years, stops at the point of her death and I suspect they lent her more than she could afford during that time as she had very little income.

Not used to banks admitting any kind of error, let alone unprompted; and yes @OhComeOnFFS its a shame they couldn’t have behaved in such a way when she was alive, it would have made a lot of difference to her.

Really appreciate the posts, thank you all.