IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Martin Lewis’ charity Money and Mental Health awarded new super-complainant powers by Treasury
12 February 2026
The Money and Mental Health Policy Institute, the charity founded and chaired by Martin Lewis (MoneySavingExpert) to break the toxic link between money and mental health issues, has today been recommended for super-complainant status by the Treasury – granting it special powers to raise issues of consumer harms to financial regulators.
Money and Mental Health will be given the power to raise super-complaints to the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR), which oversee financial services and payment systems respectively.
This follows on from last year when Money and Mental Health was given equivalent powers to take super-complaints to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), the UK’s consumer watchdog.
Money and Mental Health is only the fourth organisation to have super-complaint status for the FCA, PSR and CMA. The others are Which?, Citizens Advice and the Consumer Council for Northern Ireland.
The charity now has the power to escalate the case for action on specific consumer harms from each of the three regulators. Regulators would have to respond within 90 days of a super-complaint being made and subsequent steps could include taking enforcement action to stop consumer harms or recommending that the government change legislation.
Money and Mental Health founder, funder and chair Martin Lewis says:
“We’re thrilled to now get this status with major financial regulators, just a year on from getting the same super-complainant powers for the UK’s competition regulator. In simple terms it means that if we do detailed formal authoritative research on an issue of consumer harm the FCA must respond and potentially consider a formal investigation. In other words it’s an ‘add or bump up specific issues on the list’ power.
“We will be starting to research where best to first use this to tackle the harms that people with serious mental health problems too often face in consumer markets whether this is overcharged insurance or over-aggressive debt collection.
“This status not only gives us formal powers to tackle harms, it’s also a kite mark of the charity’s research quality, showing the authority that the talented Money and Mental Health team bring to their work – and that should hopefully extend the soft power of our research.
“I set up the charity because money problems and mental health issues are a marriage made in hell. They feed off each other. People who have mental health problems are over three times more likely to be in debt than the rest of the population. This new status is another hugely important tool for us to use to weaken the link between the two.”
How Money and Mental Health’s super-complaint status works
The super-complainant status will be awarded by the Treasury in March, once the relevant legislative amendment is approved. It will give us exclusive powers under the Financial Services and Markets Act (FSMA) 2000 and the Financial Services (Banking Reform) Act 2013 to raise complaints to the FCA and PSR about consumer harms caused by market failures or behaviour by financial services including current account providers, mortgage lenders, credit card companies, insurance companies and pension providers.
If we take forward a super-complaint, the FCA and/or PSR have to respond within 90 days. Subsequent steps could include the FCA and PSR taking enforcement action to stop consumer harms, recommending that the government change legislation, or starting a further investigation into the issues at hand. The FCA and PSR can also work with other regulators in their response.
Contact:
To set up an interview or for any other media enquiries, please contact Alex Goodfellow, External Affairs Officer, on 07754 446272 or [email protected].
Notes to Editors
- The Money and Mental Health Policy Institute was set up by Martin Lewis in spring 2016, registered charity number 1166493.
- It conducts research and develops policies for essential services firms, regulators, the health service and government to help people with mental health problems protect themselves from financial difficulties and get out of debt.
- Martin Lewis CBE, Money Saving Expert, is an award-winning campaigning broadcaster, newspaper columnist and author. He founded MoneySavingExpert.com in 2003 for £100 and remains its full-time Editor-in-Chief. It is now the UK’s biggest money site, with more than 14 million monthly users. Martin has his own prime-time ITV programme – The Martin Lewis Money Show – and is resident expert on This Morning, Good Morning Britain and BBC Radio 5 Live’s Consumer Panel, among others
- Previous super-complaints include Which?’s super-complaint to the FCA in 2025, which highlighted concerns about the home and travel insurance markets – claiming that these two types of insurance have some of the lowest levels of claims acceptance rates, with a hugely detrimental impact on consumers when things go wrong. In response the FCA said it would expand its work to improve standards in the home and travel insurance markets.