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The following sections examine:

  • the overall new disputes received for the year
  • the dispute figures for each product line
  • the product categories disputes within each major product line, and
  • types of members we have and the categories of disputes received about them.

In the vast majority of cases, consumers call us with questions about an issue rather than a dispute and sometimes their dispute may not fall within our jurisdiction (see The disputes we resolved). Consequently only 13% of initial calls result in the logging of a dispute.



The number of new disputes overall this financial year was up 33% on the last financial year. This is not surprising given the economic conditions and weather events of 2008-2009.

 

While we continue to see higher volumes of disputes about credit and insurance, the most significant increase has been the 68% increase in disputes about investments. As the share market has fallen and property prices have wavered, consumers have suffered losses. This has caused consumers to question whether strategies advised to them and adopted were appropriate in the first place and potential deficiencies in sales practices have been highlighted. In falling markets deficiencies in service are also highlighted. For instance, the delay in the implementation of a request for redemption or the delay in the adoption of a more conservative approach may result in significant losses.

3,285 disputes were still in ‘registration’ at the end of the period. These are not included in the new disputes received % (as they are yet to be classified by product) but they do appear in the new disputes overall bar chart.

We saw a rise in disputes across almost all product categories.
The following information shows:

  • the number of disputes received in 2007-2008
  • the number of disputes received in 2008-2009
  • the percentage increase or decrease in the number of disputes received from 2007-2008 to 2008-2009
  • the percentage of disputes within each product category contributing to the total number of disputes received about the product line in 2008-2009, and
  • the percentage of total disputes for each product category.