Complaints

Entities have a customer care service or department to resolve complaints submitted by their customers. Its operation is provided for in a Customer Defence Regulation that can be consulted in their offices and on their website, if the contracts have been concluded by telematic means. The deadline for submitting a complaint must be defined in the Regulation.

Complaints must be submitted to the entities’ customer care services in writing, stating their date, and customers must keep a copy of them, stamped by the entity, so that they can prove that they have completed this formality.

The customer care departments or services and, where appropriate, the customer ombudsman, have two months to issue a reasoned statement, starting from the date of receipt of the complaint. Should you not receive a response within one month, or if you are not satisfied with the reply provided, you will have a period of one year to file a complaint with the Complaints Service. The Complaints Service may admit the claim as long as no more than five years have passed since the events subject to the complaint occurred and up to the date of the filing the claim with the entity's customer service department or the client’s ombudsman.

The entities’ customer care services must provide investors with the form through which they can submit the complaint to the Complaints Service.

Any and all such responses as may be received from the customer care department or the customer ombudsman must be notified to the interested party within a period of ten calendar days from the date on which the decision is made, by the same means through which the complaint was filed.

The Complaints Service is responsible for dealing with investors’ complaints in relation to the activities of investment firms, credit institutions (when they provide investment services), as well as investment fund management companies and investment companies.

The complaint must necessarily include the following information:

• Identification of the interested party or complaining party: forename and surname(s), D.N.I. (Spanish national identity document number), address for delivering notifications and contact telephone number.
• Identification of the entity against which the complaint has been made and office in which the facts occurred.
• Reason or grounds for the complaint.
• Statement that the facts have not been nor are they the subject of court proceedings, arbitration or analysis in any other administrative or judicial court.
• Copy of the complaint filed with the Customer Care Service or the Customer Ombudsman for the entity or documentary evidence that a month has elapsed without them having received a response from the entity.
• Place, date and signature.
• Any document or data deemed appropriate to support the complaint.

It is mandatory to use the website form, which can be sent electronically, or the PDF form, which can be obtained from financial institutions and from CNMV itself, and which must be sent to the Complaints Service: C/ Edison, 4, 28006 Madrid – C/ Bolivia 56, (4 ª Planta) 08018 Barcelona.

With regard to online filing of complaints by investors, the Complaints Service has prepared an explanatory guide and a video to facilitate online filing of complaints and their subsequent monitoring, also online. The guide explains the process to investors. It includes four simple steps and reminds investors how to access the complaint after it has been filed to find out its processing status. The online procedure is quick, safe and easily accessible through various electronic devices.

The Complaints Service examines the admissibility of the complaint and communicates its admission or request for correction of any term if necessary.

Once admitted, the entity in relation to which the complaint has been submitted is notified of such complaint, so that it can file pleadings within a period of twenty-one calendar days. The entity must send these pleadings to the complaining party so that the latter can make a statement in regard to them, also within a period of twenty-one calendar days.

The maximum period for resolving complaints is ninety calendar days. If this is not possible, this circumstance must be reported and the causes that have prevented it must be included in the final report.

The final report contains clear, precise and reasoned conclusions on the entity’s conduct in the case at hand. This report:

• Is merely for informative purposes and is not binding on the parties. However, the entity must inform the supervisor of the steps taken in relation to resolved claims with a favourable report issued to the complaining party.
• It is not considered an actionable administrative act and, therefore, it cannot be appealed before administrative or judicial bodies.
• It does not provide for economic valuations of the possible damages caused to users of financial services, since only the courts of justice can recognise this type of request.

In the course of the proceedings the interested parties may withdraw their complaint, which would result in such proceedings being closed for the complainant. They can also come to an agreement with the entities to close the proceedings.