Investec has set aside funds to pay for possible compensation and other costs linked to its auto finance business in the UK as regulators continue with an industrywide probe into whether such loans were sold in a way that treated customers fairly. The South African lender will provide an exact amount for the provision when it reports its annual results in May, Chief Executive Officer Fani Titi said on a media call on Wednesday.
The system, which the regulator banned in 2021, ultimately incentivised dealers to pick a higher rate for customers. “It was a global industry practice, so it’s not something that has only been limited to the UK; many countries have come out and said they would like these practices to be tidied up,” Alan Pullinger, the outgoing CEO of FirstRand, said in an interview. “But now we are gonna go back and, and now we want to readdress from what happened 20 years ago.