A ruling in your favour is not money in your account

On 17th June 2026 the government decided the Energy Ombudsman should be able to force a supplier to pay, not just rule that it should. That distinction is the whole story of the week.

Most people believe a consumer dispute ends when someone in authority agrees with them. The ombudsman upholds the complaint, the company sends a holding email, and you let your shoulders drop. I have run disputes across eight industries, several as deputy for a vulnerable person I look after, and the agreement was almost never the hard part. The hard part arrived afterwards, in the weeks when a firm that had been told to pay simply did not, and the system had very little to say about it.

This week three separate parts of the machine moved on that gap, the space between winning and being paid.

Start with energy. According to the government's 17th June response to its 2025 consultation, summarised by MoneySavingExpert on 22nd June, the Energy Ombudsman will be given power to force suppliers to pay compensation where they implement redress late or not at all, with clearer routes to court when a firm ignores a decision. The same package shortens the clock. The supplier gets six weeks to resolve a complaint rather than eight, the ombudsman stage drops from six weeks to four, and a complaint auto-transfers to the ombudsman after six weeks where the consumer agrees. Read past the timeline change and you see the admission underneath it. The old design assumed that once the ombudsman ruled, payment followed. It did not always follow, so the ruling is being given teeth.

Now the FCA. On 25th June the regulator censured CACEIS UK over weak financial crime controls tied to the collapse of WealthTek, but the censure is the headline and the money is where this gets interesting. The FCA calculated a fine of £23.091m before discount, then set it aside in favour of a £31.7m voluntary payment for the benefit of WealthTek clients, paid out through the administrators and the Financial Services Compensation Scheme. A fine goes to the Treasury. A redress payment goes to the people who lost money. Faced with a choice between punishing the firm and paying the consumer, the FCA chose the consumer, as part of a wider effort that has now recovered more than £57m for WealthTek clients in about a year.

Then motor finance, which is the cautionary half of the pattern. The FCA's redress scheme for discretionary commission, PS26/3, published on 30th March 2026, reaches a milestone on 30th June, the date by which firms must be ready to assess agreements taken from 1st April 2014. The scale is enormous, roughly 12.1 million agreements and about £7.5bn in expected redress, at an average near £830. And almost none of it is moving. The scheme has been paused since early May under legal challenges, with hearings unlikely before October. Here is redress designed in full, costed to the pound, and frozen, because the route from decision to payment runs through a courtroom that has not sat yet. Energy is building an enforcement runway. Motor finance shows what a scheme looks like without one.

So what does a consumer do with this.

Treat the day you win as the start of a second case, not the end of the first. The ruling is an instruction, and instructions get ignored. If your win comes from the Financial Ombudsman you already hold more than people realise. A money award you accept is binding on the firm under section 228 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, and under Schedule 17 to that Act it is enforceable through the courts in the same way as a county court order. You do not re-argue the merits, you enforce them.

In practice that looks like this. Get the decision and the figure in writing, with a date for payment, before you celebrate. Diarise that payment date the way you diarised your complaint deadline, and chase on the day it passes, not the week you happen to remember. And know your enforcement route before you need it. For a Financial Ombudsman award it is the court, under the Act above. For energy it is about to become the ombudsman itself. For a county court judgment it is a warrant of control or a charging order, not another polite letter.

I track this on every case I run, because whether a company actually pays what it agreed tells you more than its complaints score does. This week's headline was the timeline cut on the energy side, and the quieter news underneath was that the people who build the system have noticed a ruling is not a payment and have started to build for the difference. You should too.

Also worth your time this week

A working roundup of what moved in UK consumer rights over the past week, with links to the source.

• The Energy Ombudsman is getting power to force suppliers to pay. The government's 17th June response to its 2025 consultation will let the ombudsman compel compensation where firms implement redress late or not at all, and cuts the complaint clock from eight plus six weeks to six plus four, with auto-transfer to the ombudsman after six weeks. MoneySavingExpert.
• Buy Now Pay Later becomes regulated on 15th July. From that date BNPL users get clearer pre-borrowing information, affordability checks, a right to complain to the Financial Ombudsman, and Section 75 Consumer Credit Act protection in some cases. FCA.
• The FCA put £31.7m back in clients' hands over WealthTek. Rather than a £23.091m fine, the regulator censured CACEIS UK and secured a voluntary payment for WealthTek clients, part of more than £57m recovered for them in about a year. FCA.
• Motor finance redress hits its 30th June milestone, but stays frozen. Firms must be ready to assess post-1st April 2014 agreements under PS26/3, a scheme covering roughly 12.1 million agreements and about £7.5bn, yet it remains paused under legal challenge with hearings unlikely before October. FCA.
• New data-complaint rules are live. The Data (Use and Access) Act 2025 data-protection provisions took effect on 19th June. You now have to raise a data concern with the organisation first before escalating to the ICO, and firms must run a compliant complaints process. ICO.
• The CMA tested its new pricing powers in court. Its action against mattress retailer Emma Group over strike-through reference pricing and false urgency claims went to trial from 23rd June, an early use of direct consumer-enforcement powers under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act. Baker McKenzie.
• Ofcom closed its One Touch Switch enforcement programme. The regulator judged that most consumers are now switching broadband and phone providers successfully through the gaining-provider-led process, almost two years after the system's delayed launch. ISPreview.
• Three recalls worth checking your cupboards and bedrooms for. Krispy Kreme pulled two doughnut lines over undeclared hazelnuts (21st June), the Traditional Cheese Company recalled French Brie over Listeria (19th June), and BHS mattress enhancers plus two Yaheetech furniture lines were recalled for failing UK flammability standards. All carry a right to a refund. Which?.
• Citizens Advice says 19 million people have been hit by 'green scams'. Cons tied to home energy-efficiency upgrades such as insulation, heat pumps and solar are spreading, and the charity has published safety tips and template letters. Citizens Advice.

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