Fintern Ltd · DRN-6166768

The complaint Mr M complains that Fintern Ltd (trading as Abound) defaulted his account unfairly. What happened Mr M says that Abound emailed him on 25 November 2025 and told him his account was on hold while it waited for his income and expenditure (I&E) information. He says there was no deadline to complete the form and that Abound was aware of his disabilities that meant he needed reasonable time for complex administrative tasks. Mr M says the subsequent default of his account, on 30 December 2025, was a breach of the written assurance that his account was on hold and a failure to treat him fairly as a vulnerable customer. Abound says that Mr M made his last payment on 24 July 2025. It says that it requested a review of Mr M’s income and expenditure on 7 August 2025 but didn’t receive it before Mr M called on 10 September 2025. Abound says that in this call Mr M requested communications by email and a single point of contact. Abound confirms that it put a “contact hold” on Mr M’s account so he wouldn’t receive any calls or text messages, but advised him that regulatory letters would still need to be sent. Abound says that it also stopped attempting payments via Mr M’s Continuous Payment Authority and explained that arrears would continue to increase, and that action would need to be taken to prevent the account defaulting. Abound says it requested Mr M’s permission to use Open Banking several times between September and November 2025 so that it could assess his financial situation. It says that he finally refused to give his permission to access Open Banking on 24 November 2025, so, instead, it sent him an I&E form to complete. As this was never returned, Abound says that no repayment plan was set up and arrears continued to increase. It says the account defaulted on 30 December 2025, but it was satisfied that Mr M’s credit record was a fair reflection of the management of his account. Our investigator did not recommend that the complaint should be upheld. She did not find that Abound had acted unfairly in defaulting the account and that its decision was based on sustained arrears and a lack of affordability information on which to base a repayment plan. Mr M responded to say, in summary that: • The alternative to Open Banking did not enable meaningful engagement; • His disability does not only affect communication preferences; • It would have been reasonable for Abound to check whether he required assistance before progressing the default; • There was no clear deadline for returning the income and expenditure information; • “On hold” implies that collections activity would not progress;

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• The process did not adequately account for a known vulnerability. What I’ve decided – and why I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. Mr M initially took out a £3,000 loan on 13 September 2024. This was topped up on 30 April 2025 and Abound approved the higher loan amount of £9,932.99. Mr M made the first three loan payments of £249.12 in May, June and July 2025. On 4 August 2025, Mr M notified Abound that he’d been dismissed from his job and, although he was appealing it, he was in the process of applying for Universal Credit and would not be able to afford his loan repayments. At this point, Mr M told Abound that he was disabled and wasn’t confident of finding alternative suitable employment. I now need to consider whether Abound acted fairly and reasonably with respect to Mr M’s specific complaint points in the lead up to the application of the default. Reasonable Adjustments In response to Mr M’s email about losing his job, I can see Abound said, “Could you kindly let us know what your disability is, and whether it affects your ability to manage your financial situation? This will help us to understand how best we can support you during this time.” I can’t see Mr M responded to this request, but he followed it up on 10 September 2025 with another email which requested the cessation of all calls and voicemails as they were causing him additional distress. Abound replied the same day to confirm it would put an immediate 30-day contact hold on Mr M’s account, although it noted it was still required to send some letters as his loan arrears increased. It also assigned a primary contact to Mr M and suspended further payment attempts. Within the same email, Abound again asked if Mr M was happy to share details of his disability so it could offer additional support if required. When Mr M responded later that day, he didn’t expand on his disability, but confirmed that communicating as it had been was the best way for Abound to support him. He also said he was happy to complete an electronic I&E form. On 16 September 2025, Abound again asked Mr M for a little more detail about his disability in order to tailor its support. It added that, if Mr M was willing to give his consent, it could complete the affordability assessment via Open Banking. Abound chased Mr M for his Open Banking consent on 17 October 2025 and 29 October 2025. Then, on 20 November 2025, Abound noted that Mr M had said he was happy to complete an electronic I&E assessment and attached the form to the email.

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On 24 November 2025, Mr M responded to say he was not prepared to give his consent for Open Banking as it caused him increased anxiety to give that level of access to his data. He reiterated his willingness to complete an electronic I&E form, but clarified that his Universal Credit application had been categorised as a Limited Capability for Work and Work-Related Activity (LCWRA) and this was likely to be a long-term, non-temporary change. The following day, Abound reassured Mr M that he was not required to renew the Open Banking access and explained that the I&E file had already been sent to him. It also offered to help him complete the form if he needed support. Based on everything I’ve seen, I’m satisfied that Abound provided reasonable adjustments throughout the process. I say that because: • On at least three occasions Abound asked Mr M for further details of his disability so that it could provide appropriate support; • Abound put a contact hold on Mr M’s account, assigned a primary contact and suspended further payment attempts; • Although Mr M said his disability does not only affect communication preferences, he also confirmed that “communicating in writing like this is the best way to support me”; • Abound did not insist that Mr M renewed his Open Banking consent even though the loan’s terms and conditions say: o “You must provide us with consent to renew your Open Banking connections…” and; o “We may terminate this agreement if you do not renew the consent.” • Abound offered to assist Mr M with completing the I&E form if he needed it. So, I can’t conclude that Abound didn’t go far enough when considering the reasonable adjustments it made for Mr M. Income and Expenditure Form Following the default of his account, Mr M contacted Abound and explained that he had been working to complete the form, but that his disabilities meant that he needed reasonable time for complex administration. I have looked at a copy of the form that Abound sent to Mr M and I accept that Mr M said his difficulties would have caused him to need additional time to complete it. However, I can’t say that the form is unreasonably complex and I do acknowledge that Abound offered to help Mr M with its completion. Given that this was the alternative to the Open Banking, which was a condition of Mr M having the loan account, I’m satisfied that the form itself was a fair method to collect the information that Abound was requesting from Mr M. Therefore, I cannot agree with Mr M that it would not have enabled meaningful engagement on completion. Late Payment Fees

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In its email on 10 September 2025, Abound said it would stop any late payment fees while “we are helping you towards a solution”. I have looked at the loan statement and I can see that, while the late payment fee was not applied in September 2025, there were three late fees of £12 applied to the account after August 2025. Abound has now offered to refund the £36 as a gesture of goodwill. Default I have now considered whether Abound did anything wrong when it defaulted Mr M’s account on 30 December 2025. Following Mr M’s email in September, I can see Abound replied with an email which said “being in arrears on your loan account will be reported to the credit reference agencies”. This was followed by the default notice on 16 October which stated: “If you do not take the action required by this notice before the date shown then the further action set out below may be taken against you: • We will also register information about your failure to pay with credit reference agencies (CRAs).” Both the emails on 29 October 2025 and 20 November 2025 said: “Your loan is still on hold, but will continue to fall into arrears. As your loan falls further into arrears, it may default, which means we would have to record a default marker on your credit file.” I acknowledge that Mr M said he’d been given no deadline for completion of the I&E form and that the latest email on 25 November 2025 said his account would remain on hold while Abound waited for the information. However, it also said that “you will still receive the required arrears letter” and clarified that “you will not receive collection contact”. Given Mr M’s last payment was in July 2025, and he’d received regular notifications warning that increasing arrears could lead to CRA reporting and a default, I don’t think it was unreasonable for Abound to default the account when it did. I acknowledge that Mr M has requested that his account should be on hold indefinitely, but I don’t consider that is reasonable given Mr M owes Abound the money. That said, Abound has confirmed that interest and charges are now frozen which was another request from Mr M. So, as Abound is obliged to report accurate information to the CRAs to enable other lenders to make informed decisions, I do not find that the default should be removed. Indeed, doing so is likely to be detrimental to Mr M if he cannot resume his contractual repayments. Any repayment plan is only intended to be a short-term solution and, upon completion, a consumer would need to revert to contractual repayments plus any arrears. As Mr M has confirmed that his employment situation is unlikely to improve, and his household income has dropped by over £1,800, I can understand that a £249 monthly loan repayment won’t be

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a priority bill. As a default stays on a credit file for six years, removing it now - only for it to be reapplied later - would not benefit Mr M. In summary, I haven’t seen evidence that Abound acted unfairly or made an error in applying the default, and I don’t require it to do anything in addition to refunding the £36 it has now offered to Mr M. That said, I would remind Abound of its duty to respond positively and sympathetically to customer’s in financial difficulty. My final decision My decision is that I do not uphold this complaint. Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mr M to accept or reject my decision before 3 April 2026. Amanda Williams Ombudsman

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