Chip and PIN

[Ian Batten]

On 25 Jan 08, at 1604, PeteM wrote:

> Ian Batten wrote  on 25-01-08 15:10:
>> Unfortunately, we don't know (a) what the ratio between customer- 
>> bad and customer-good ATM/Card fraud is and (b) how many people  
>> who go to the ombudsman are trying it on (the latter is  
>> unknowable, of course).
>> Are there cases where the ombudsman gets it wrong?  Of course: all  
>> systems are justice are faulty.  Does the ombudsman get it  
>> consistently wrong because of regulator capture?  It wouldn't  
>> surprise me.   But some people here appear to believe that the  
>> ombudsman should automatically find for the customer, because  
>> customers are honest as the day is long and banks are all guilty.
>
>
> Perhaps you mean me. I certainly believed that the elderly man on  
> the Y&Y programne was defrauded, it is almost inconceivable that he  
> would do what he did if he really was guilty.

But on the other hand, if he had obviously been defrauded, I presume  
your contention is that the Financial Ombudsman is so deep in the  
pockets of the banks that it is rejecting complaints that are  
obviously valid, knowing them to be valid?   It would only take one  
such case to come out --- and whistleblowing is possible in all  
organisations --- and the ombudsman would collapse.  Why would the  
bank/ombudsman conspiracy risk their black helicopters for three  
grand?  And if the banks exert a magnetic effect on regulators such  
that they will risk public ridicule for rejecting obvious cases, how  
come those self-same regulators have pummelled the banks for millions  
over the selling of endowment mortgages, and the pressuring of  
members of DB pension schemes to buy DC pensions?

[[ My mother left her then union when they started allowing wide boys  
to market DC pensions to teachers through union channels; personally  
I think anyone with post-18 education who was taken in by that scam  
deserves their fate, and I'm hardly more sympathetic to anyone who  
didn't understand the risks of low cost endowments, but that's why  
I'm not a financial regulator. ]]

It's routine for people who have started a hare running to feel they  
have to see it through, and it may well be that he genuinely believe  
he is innocent.  But two minutes of his story on that haven of  
accurate reporting You & Yours isn't evidence, and isn't enough to  
base a judgement on. There are plenty of people who will convincingly  
tell You and Yours that a WiFi basestation ruined their health until  
it was cured by homeopathy, but I trust we don't regard that as  
conclusive...

Every athlete nicked for drug use protests their innocence, their  
willingness to take blood tests, their faith, their love of their  
family and all the rest.  Some of them are knowingly guilty and  
hoping to erect a smokescreen.  Some have been deluded by their  
entourage.  But it's nonsense to believe that none of them are guilty.

ian


ian