Minutes from the monthly meeting of the Bank of England’s rate-setting committee have revealed that all nine members were unanimous in the decision to freeze interest rates and not increase the programme of quantitative easing this month. However, some members said that a further expansion of asset purchases was likely to be required at some point in the future.

Many experts expect more money to be injected this spring. In the minutes from the Monetary Policy Committee meeting, the group also noted that the risk of ‘a more severe dislocation’ in the euro area arising from banking sector difficulties appears to have been mitigated by the actions of the European Central Bank.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has barred Direct Line from showing a TV advert again after it was found to have misled consumers.

The ad for featuring TV presenter Sarah Beeney explained the difference between landlord insurance and regular home insurance, and showed in large text the message: “we guarantee to beat any quote”.

In smaller text, the ad showed the words: “New customers only. Cover on an equivalent basis to ours. Minimum premiums apply. Cover excludes NI. Qualifying criteria apply.”

The ASA ruled that Direct Line’s pledge to “guarantee any quote” was an “absolute claim” which contradicted the insurer’s limit on quotes to those of a minimum premium.

Direct Line’s ad was found in breach of broadcast advertising rules and must not be shown in its current form again, the ASA ruled.

Yet another example of why it pays to be wary of direct marketing and advertising. Always seek Independent Financial Advice.

Our whole system’s in crisis: Mervyn King warns mortgage rates are likely to soar

Mortgage rates are set to soar as the Governor of the Bank of England warned the ‘extraordinarily serious and threatening’ crisis in the eurozone is damaging Britain. The Bank’s financial policy committee said banks were facing higher borrowing rates and may try to pass this on within months – resulting in a ‘significant increase’ in lending rates.

The sobering report came as governor Sir Mervyn King issued a dire warning about the threat posed to Britain by the euro crisis – because our banks have more than £500billion tied up in European institutions. Sir Mervyn said the situation was spiralling out of control and deteriorating conditions in the markets were ‘characteristic of a systemic crisis’.

Source : Daily Mail page 9 – 2.12.11. Also reported in The Daily Telegraph page B4 and The Times page 1.

The key measure of financial stress in the British banking system has hit its highest level for more than two years. The three-month London Inter-Bank Offered Rate (Libor) – the interest rate that reflects banks’ willingness to lend to each other – reached 1% for the first time since July 2009 on Wednesday. It means that banks are now charging each other almost twice as much as the Bank of England’s base rate of 0.5% to borrow money. In normal conditions, the gap between base rate and Libor is typically 0.15-0.2%; the rise to 0.5% indicates growing alarm about the safety of the financial system.

The bad news for consumers is that Libor is one of the key elements in mortgage pricing, and a sustained rise in Libor soon feeds through to higher mortgage rates.

Source : The Guardian page 36 – 10.11.11.

In a comparison site satisfaction survey, Which? Money found that the average customer score for these websites was lower for than any other financial sector it has surveyed; no site scored higher than 50%.

Only three in ten said they trusted them to find the best price available, while two thirds thought they would be presented with products that make the websites the most commission.

A quarter of people said they did not buy through a comparison site because they found a cheaper quote elsewhere and 12% said they were unhappy with the quotes they were given.

Even after searching for products on comparison sites, more than half said they bought the product directly from the provider.

Several sites also set quite high default voluntary excesses when a Which? Money expert looked at them in detail. These voluntary excesses are often then combined with the insurer’s compulsory excess on the results page, making it difficult for customers to make comparisons between sites and find the best policy to suit their needs.

The most popular sites were Moneysupermarket.com, Confused.com and Gocompare.com.
Car insurance, home insurance and savings accounts were the most searched for products on the comparison sites.

James Daley, editor of Which? Money, says:

“We found that using financial comparison sites is clearly not a happy experience for many – all the sites in our survey got low customer scores.

“If you’re shopping around for a good deal, it makes sense to go to more than one site and be aware that some companies aren’t featured. Watch out for things like voluntary excess, and make sure the policy you’re offered is what you actually want.”

It appears consumers are still ignorant about payments being taken by product comparison sites.

Recent YouGov research found 10.1 million people in Britain used a comparison site in the last year, resulting in an average commission of £64.59 each.

It discovered consumers underestimated these commissions taken by comparison sites, with a fifth putting this at 5% of their purchase, and another fifth saying it stood between 5% and 10%.

In fact, the research claims, the average commission is actually 24%.

Consumers said they used comparison sites because they believed the sites provide the cheapest deals (37%) and helped to save time when renewing insurance (27%).

We would suggest that, as we can research the market for you, guide you to the most appropriate products at the most competitive premiums, why not save yourself the time, effort and risk and let us do the work, professionally, free of charge – contact us today.

I can advise that matters have always been dealt with extremely quickly and efficiently, which has enabled me to secure purchases on properties.

I have been very impressed and pleased with the service I have received and would have no hesitation whatsoever recommending them.