Guarantees Decision Reference 2020-0314

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Case Outcome: Upheld
• Date: 23 September 2020
• Year: 2020
• Conducts Complained Of: Failure to process instructions in a timely manner
• Finantial Sector: Banking
• Reference: 2020-0314

Decision Ref:

2020-0314

Sector:

Banking

Product / Service:

Guarantees

Conduct(s) complained of:

Failure to process instructions in a timely manner

Outcome:

Upheld

LEGALLY BINDING DECISION

OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND PENSIONS OMBUDSMAN

The complaint is in relation to the asserted failure by the Provider to release the

Complainant from three personal guarantees when requested to do so in January 2017. The

personal guarantees were put in place for a limited company, which the Complainant was

previously a director and beneficial owner of. The Complainant also cites delays in

communications and customer service grievances.

The Complainant’s Case

The Complainant states that he “resigned and sold [his] shares” when he left the company

in January 2017. He states that, on the basis of the advice he received over the telephone

from a representative of the Provider, he wrote to the Provider on 13 January 2017 to

inform it of his resignation and the selling of his shareholding to the remaining business

partners. In the same correspondence he requested them to remove his “personal

guarantees for the overdraft of the [Ltd Company]”. The Complainant asserts that he did

not receive a response from the Provider at that time but that he had been told by a

representative of the Provider that once he sent in the letter, his removal as a guarantor

would be taken care of. The Complainant submits that the loans had been “repaid in full”

and that the “bank Overdraft was the only remaining facility”.

The Complainant states that he was alarmed to receive a letter from the Provider in

December 2017, stating that the [Ltd Company] “has entered financial difficulties and [his]

Personal Guarantee [was] still in place”.