Families waiting SIX months for payouts from Scottish Widows

Two grieving families have shot down Scottish widows after waiting six months for their inheritance.

In both cases, an elderly parent had died and the families had to receive money from a pension or an investment.

But even though they had requested the claim form to withdraw money or had already filled it out, they had to wait months. The delays were attributed to IT issues and missing files, the families claim.

But when Money Mail took up the two cases, the pension giant sprang into action and refunded the money within days.

Scottish Widows would not say how many people were affected by delays or disclose the reason.

But earlier in the year it admitted customers were experiencing “unacceptable delays” and pledged to “increase resources and make changes.”

A Scottish Widows spokesperson said: ‘We are sorry for the delays some customers have experienced; the service level is not up to our normal standards.

“We are working hard to improve this by recruiting and training more customer service personnel, investing in our systems and simplifying our procedures.”

Bereaved daughter Cathy McKay thought it would be a simple process to obtain the money left in her late father’s estate at Scottish Widows.

When her father, John Woods, died in May aged 72, he left Cathy and her two sisters £80,000 in the form of a private pension that he had saved for during his career as a casino manager.

But after a six-month battle to get the money, they were still waiting – until Money Mail’s involvement last week.

According to official guidelines from the Financial Ombudsman, these payments must be made within just ten business days after a provider receives a claim form. But Cathy had to wait 110 days to get the right form.

The 51-year-old called weekly, sent countless emails and letters, but hadn’t even received the form needed to file her claim.

“It just kept going,” she says. “It is extremely frustrating that Scottish Widows can treat people this way and hold on to our heritage. I have called over and over for the last four months because nothing was wrong.

“They kept saying they would send the form and I felt they had a real attitude and told me to ‘just wait.'” Within a day of Money Mail’s investigation, Cathy received an apology from Scottish Widows, along with an email version of the form to complete.

Extra grief: in both cases an elderly parent had died and the families had to get money from a pension or an investment

Payment was processed a week later, along with £222.80 to cover missed interest and £600 compensation for the inconvenience.

A spokesperson says the delay was due to human error: “We are very sorry for the delay in settling this claim. “We’ll make sure Mrs. McKay doesn’t get left out on this one.”

Sarah Morgan, 53 – a single mother, who is on Universal Credit, says she was supposed to get a grant to help pay for the funeral, despite her mother, Jane Clifford, setting aside money to cover it.

“It’s totally unacceptable — it’s not what my mother would have wanted,” she says. “I feel like I’ve met wall after wall, and trying to find the energy to call these people every week is exhausting. It’s so frustrating to know that the money is just somewhere.”

Sarah, from Devon, owes £9,077, which her mother had invested during her years as a housekeeper.

Jane, who was 84 when she died, had tried to withdraw the money in June after she was diagnosed with terminal cancer.

However, she made a mistake with the bank account number when ordering the transfer, so the money never arrived and has been in limbo ever since.

Sarah was promised the money within 15 business days of submitting her application at the end of July, but she still hadn’t seen any of it.

She has since been told that the IT department is still trying to trace the funds. ‘I’m trying to make ends meet now. It’s the last thing you need when you’re grieving,” she says. And I’m still dealing with my son’s death last year, who was 19.

“I would have given up if it wasn’t such a large sum.”

Within a week of the Money Mail inquiry, Sarah received her mother’s inheritance, plus £500 in damages and £235.56 in interest – a total of £9,813.

“They miraculously found the money. It really shouldn’t work that way,” she says.

A spokesperson for Scottish Widows said: ‘We are very sorry that we have not dealt with Mrs Clifford’s claim sooner. We have now processed the payment.’

In September, our Consumer Champion Sally Hamilton helped a reader struggling to recover his late wife’s £16,773 from Scottish Widows. The company offers pensions, life insurance and investments.

After contacting Scottish Widows, it confirmed it had all the forms and was processing the payment, including 8 per cent interest, plus a further £300 for the inconvenience caused.

j.beard@dailymail.co.uk