£250m paid out to Icesave savers

Monday, 17 November 2008 01:04

Icesave customers have now received £250 million in compensation.

Last week the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) started to pay out to the 230,000 UK savers who were hit when the Icelandic bank failed.

In total £4 billion is expected to be returned in the coming weeks.

So far 10,000 savers have received their cash back.

FSCS chief executive Loretta Minghella said: "Five weeks ago a lot of Icesave savers were worried that they were going to be left high and dry.

"Now they can be confident that the electronic process is underway and people are getting their money back."

She added: "The majority of those offered have already completed their part of the online process, and the first customers to be paid out received their compensation by BACS transfer yesterday."

Savers still waiting for their cash should have been contacted already by the FSCS by email.

A second email will ask them to log on to their Icesave accounts as the normally would have done and then they can nominate an account for funds to be transferred to by BACS.

Savers are also warned to be aware of phishing emails asking them to click through to fake websites.

Normally the FSCS only provides compensation up to the first £50,000 of savings.

However, over the financial crisis, Alistair Darling stated that no Icesave customer would lose any money - despite the fact under the regulations the first slice of compensation for a failed bank should have come from Iceland.

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