Many consumers who were persuaded to take payment protection insurance (PPI) with their finance were misled about the true nature of the insurance premium. Consumers were not told that a large proportion of the insurance premium was, in fact, commission paid to the brokers and lenders for their profits. This meant consumers not only paid for the secret commission but also paid interest on the finance relating to those sums.
This was scandalous and the largest breach of consumer trust by financial institutions in recent memory. Think this was unfair? So did the highest court in the land, the Supreme Court, in its much-celebrated judgment in the case of Plevin v. Paragon.
Susan Plevin is a retired college lecturer who took legal action against her lender, Paragon Personal Finance (“Paragon”), after she had PPI added to a loan she took in the sum of £34,000.
During her claim for mis-sold PPI, she also discovered that 71.8% of the PPI premium added to her loan with Paragon was, in fact, secret commission. It had nothing to do with the actual cost of the insurance. This was profiteering at the highest level. Susan Plevin argued that Paragon’s failure to disclose this remarkable commission meant she had been treated “unfairly” by Paragon and therefore it was appropriate for the Court to intervene on her behalf.
The Supreme Court ruled in Susan Plevin’s favour and ordered Paragon to pay compensation to her.
“Tipping Point” compensation
Following the Plevin case, the offending lenders still refused to properly compensate victims and instead of returning the correct amount of secret commission, paid back only a proportion of the sums rightly owed to the victims. We at The Law Mind believe firmly that the lenders’ conduct in relation to Plevin claims is wrong.
Indeed, another case involving Paragon came before the Court when Mr & Mrs Doran recovered the full PPI premium together with loan interest and additional compensation. Paragon was ordered to pay the Doran’s the sum of £17,345.37.