This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Consumers making last-minute claims for mis-sold payment protection insurance (PPI) have had to deal with crashing websites and jammed phone lines as banks struggled to cope with an 11th-hour surge in complaints.

While the final deadline for making a claim is 11.59pm on Thursday 29 August, the problems prompted the Financial Conduct Authority to say that “where a firm knows that customers may have had trouble accessing their services (whether website or phone) … then we would expect them to apply a pragmatic approach to dealing with complaints received immediately after the deadline”.

Several banks have had problems with their websites, with some potential applicants being confronted with “internal server error” messages. The glitches were blamed on exceptionally high web traffic.

Santander apologised for “a brief technical issue earlier this morning [29 August]”, which meant customers were unable to access its online PPI claim form. The bank said: “This has now been resolved and we’re sorry for the inconvenience caused to customers.” Nevertheless, some people have continued to report problems with the bank’s website.

The Co-operative Bank said its online PPI form was “intermittently unavailable between 1.15pm and 2.45pm due to a technical issue”. It added it was continuing to monitor the availability of the form.

At NatWest, some potential complainants who clicked on its PPI complaint form were greeted by a message saying: “Due to system problems, we are unable to progress your application at present … Please try again later.”

Meanwhile, customers of several banks have reported long waiting times to get through on the phone.

On Twitter, one customer asked Royal Bank of Scotland: “why can’t I get through to your PPI line????????? Says busy kept trying! Ongoing claim....not good enough!”

Another asked RBS: “Why isn’t PPI number working!!!! #Dodgy.”

The bank replied: “This is due to the high call volumes. Please try again later …”

Martin Lewis, founder of the MoneySavingExpert website, had warned that some websites could crash and said consumers unable to make a claim because of technical problems must be given time to do so.

He said: “As predicted, there is unprecedented last-minute demand for reclaiming PPI … And that huge demand is causing even major bank systems to creak and struggle.

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“The obvious first advice is to take time, be prepared and be patient. However, it is simply not fair or right that people who have tried to submit a claim before the deadline and have been disenfranchised by bust bank tech miss out.”

PPI is Britain’s costliest consumer scandal, with £36bn paid out by UK banks to compensate people who bought often-worthless insurance cover, thinking it would help them repay debts in the event of sickness or unemployment. The average payout has been about £2,000. Of the total, £340m was paid out in June alone.