Aussie customers owed billions from the big banks ‒ are you eligible for a payout?

Millions of Australians have been offered compensation from the country’s biggest banks and financial institutions following misconduct reviews.

AMP, ANZ, Commonwealth Bank, Macquarie, NAB and Westpac have either paid or offered to pay around $3.15 billion in compensation to their customers as of the end of 2021, according to the latest information from the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC).

This includes almost $1.3 billion paid or offered by the institutions between 1 July and 31 December 2021.

The financial watchdog said compensation would be paid to customers who “suffered loss or detriment because of fees for no service misconduct or non-compliant advice”.

NAB will pay the largest compensation of the banks, with over $1.1 billion paid or offered for fees for no service misconduct and $92.6 million paid or offered for non-compliant advice.

It comes off the back of two major ASIC reviews into the financial advice offered by the six institutions.

Who is eligible for compensation?

Customers will be eligible for compensation if they paid fees for ongoing advice which they never received (since 2009), or they received financial advice but it was non-compliant with their institution’s obligations in the Corporations Act. For example, if the financial adviser did not give appropriate advice or did not act in the best interests of the customer.

How to know if you are eligible

You should be contacted by your bank or financial institution if you are eligible for compensation. If you have moved financial institutions since 1 January, 2009, and believe that you may be eligible for compensation but have not heard from the bank, you could contact the bank’s remediation department to make sure they have your current contact details.

According to ASIC, the majority of compensation relates to fees for no service misconduct, with over 1.2 million Australian customers eligible for a total of $2.9 billion in compensation across the six institutions.

The remaining $246.8 million in compensation relates to non-compliant advice and is payable to over 11,000 customers.

If you believe you have been impacted and haven’t been notified, you may want to consider contacting your bank directly.