The Financial Customer Defense Authority is born: fines for entities and claims of up to 20,000 euros within 90 days

After years of delay, this Tuesday the First Vice President and Minister of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation,

, has announced that the Council of Ministers has approved the draft bill to create the

, free for users and whose resolutions will be

when the amounts claimed are less than 20,000 euros.

At the press conference after the Council of Ministers, Calviño explained that the draft, which is now being submitted to a public hearing, involves the creation of the authority that will be in charge of

who have not been satisfied with the response provided by the customer service of their financial institutions.

The new figure will unify the existing claims services of the Bank of Spain, the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV) and the General Directorate of Insurance and Pension Funds (DGSFP) to increase the efficiency in the operation of these resolution entities of conflicts.

Thus, within the scope of this authority, not only banking products will be included, but also

.

To coordinate collaboration with the conduct supervision of these authorities, the governing council of the new authority will incorporate the Bank of Spain, the CNMV, the DGSFP and the General Secretariat of the Treasury.

90 day term

As Calviño has detailed, "except in exceptional cases", the new Financial Client Defense Authority will resolve claims within a maximum period of 90 days and its resolution will be binding for the financial institution when the amount claimed is less than 20,000 euros.

"This is a very important change with respect to the current situation, in which the claims services of these financial supervisors were not binding on the entities", the minister highlighted.

The claims system

for financial customers, who will be able to access it in person or by electronic means without the need for a lawyer or solicitor.

In addition, Calviño has announced that financial entities will have to pay a

, with which he wants to encourage the complaints and claims services of the financial entities themselves to resolve the conflicts of citizens "in a agile".

Entities that fail to comply with binding resolutions

and the draft bill includes an element of disincentive to resort to the courts when the financial entity does not agree with the resolution agreed by the Financial Client Defense Authority.

Delay

The creation of an authority for the protection of financial clients is a measure included in the 2022 Annual Regulatory Plan that is years late.

Thus, the initiative was raised by the previous Government of the Popular Party and the President of the Executive, Pedro Sánchez, picked it up in 2018 with the intention that the project go ahead in 2019.

However, these plans were delayed by the calling of general elections that year and, later, by the outbreak of the pandemic, which led the Ministry of Economic Affairs to focus on response measures to the crisis.

Consumer organizations had been demanding for some time that the creation of this authority be accelerated to avoid possible abuses from the financial sector and avoid additional costs to customers when making claims.

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