https://www.pressreader.com/ireland/the-irish-mail-on-sunday/20250202/282041922822238
Mis-selling Strategies
Earlier this month, the ‘€5M hush Money’ headline refers to compensation, under a Confidential Mediation outcome. The beneficiaries were a cohort of EBS Managers/ Tied-agents who were victimised for objecting to the Bank’s AIB Belfry mis-selling strategies, inter alia. Compensation to these former EBS executives consisted to (i) a financial consideration, (ii) debt write-downs and (iii) legal costs. Each settlement to an estimated 16 EBS Executives/ Tied Agents from around the country, mandatorily included a Non-Disclosure Clause. Paradoxically these NDAs were targeted at ensuring that AIB’s illegal activities remained undisclosed, under threat.
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In the ensuing years, the final four AIB Belfry products collapsed in value resulting in investors, in some cases losing all of their life savings.
AIB Belfry unsecured sunk outcome
Some of the impacted ill-fated Investors invested their Pension Funds into AIB Belfry products. Others were encouraged to take out Borrowing facilities with AIB for Belfry Products. While at the same time the Bank fully recovered its own stake in AIB Belfry investments.
AIB Belfry stakes by the Bank itself, were initially structured, to encourage private investors to lay out their own cash on the false understanding that AIB saw fit to ‘share’ the assets performance risks. In very many cases, AIB engaged in a variety of willful slight-of-hand mis-selling strategies. These were actioned subliminally. Over twenty years following on from the wholesale AIB Belfry mis-selling, remaining uncompensated Customers should now be considered to be Vulnerable Customers under the mandatory Financial Regulator’s Consumer Protection Codes, https://www.centralbank.ie/docs/default-source/regulation/consumer-protection/other-codes-of-conduct/consumer-protection-code-review/guidance-on-protecting-consumers-in-vulnerable-circumstances.pdf?sfvrsn=d55f631a_1
Although the Financial Regulator-prompted the launch of an AIB Belfry Redress Scheme in 2022, its slow-motion operation in tandem with narrow terms of reference are gradually being wrapped-up.
A substantial overhang of ‘rejected’ cases, initially refused by the Bank’s own appeal committee & subsequently by the Bank’s alleged Independent External Appeal Panel are still festering. These are in the In-tray of the overloaded & apparently deliberately under-resourced the final appeal entity, the Financial Services & Pensions Ombudsman [FSPO]. If and when the FSPO eventually issues a binding decision in such matters, that decision is subject to a potential statutory appeal to the High Court within 35 calendar days from the decision date. After such a timeframe, if not appealed the Decision becomes legal binding.
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