Postcomm publishes criteria for approval of redress schemes

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Postcomm, the independent regulator for postal services in the UK, published its final criteria for approval of redress schemes.

Under the Consumers, Estate Agents and Redress Act ("the CEAR Act", given Royal Assent on 19 July 2007), Postcomm has a statutory duty to make regulations on complaint handling standards that would apply to all licensed operators. The act also allows for the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) to require regulated postal operators to belong to a Postcomm-approved redress scheme.

Following consultation in January 2008 on approval criteria for redress schemes, Postcomm has today published its approval criteria and decision document. The document summarises the key issues raised by stakeholders in response to the consultation, suggestions from the industry working group for licensed postal operators (facilitated by Postcomm), and relevant best practice.

* The key changes are:
amendment to the scheme’s governance, monitoring and reporting criteria in relation to the governance arrangements and fee structure to ensure there is no disproportionate effect on any particular group of members;
* additional requirement for the scheme to reallocate the cost of any case to another scheme member where the fault is found to lie with it;
* amendment to the requirement for publicising the redress scheme to prevent premature referral to the scheme. The requirement now states that appropriate steps must be taken to ensure consumer awareness of the scheme;
* clarifying the complaints which the redress scheme must consider by drawing from the BERR decision document;
* and clarifying that the case handling will be free of charge but that a complainant may incur a cost in the form of telephone call charges etc. to contact the redress scheme (but that this should be kept to as low as reasonably practicable).

It is now for redress schemes to submit applications to Postcomm for approval. Postcomm’s preference is to approve a single scheme, and will only approve more than one scheme if it considers that their approval is consistent with section 49 of the CEAR Act, including that the approval of more than one scheme is in consumers’ interests. Postcomm will assess the redress scheme applications against the criteria for approval set out in this decision document.

Link to related Documents